



./ 



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THE 



ENGLISH HUMOURISTS 



EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 



% ^txin nf titkxn. 



■W-mrTHACKERAY, 

Author of " Esmond," " Pendennis," " Vanity Fair," &a. 



NEW YORK: 
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

329 & 331 PEARL STREET, 
FRANKLIN SQUARE. 

1853. 



1 2^4 



48 65 55 

JUL H 1942 



CONTENTS. 



Lecture the First. 

^ Page 

SWIFT .►..: 5 



liECTUEE THE SeCOND. 
CUNGREVE AND ADDISON 50 

Lecture the Third. 
STEELE 92 

IjEcture the Fourth. 
PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE 138 

Lecture the Fifth. 
HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING 187 

Lecture the Sixth. 
STERNE AND GOLDSMITH 228 

Lecture the Seventh. 
CHARITY AND HUMOUR 272 



THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS 



EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 



LECTURE THE FIRST. 



SWIFT. 
In treating of the English humourists of the past age, it 
is of the men and of their lives, rather than of their books, 
that I ask permission to speak to you ; and in doing so, you 
are aware that I cannot hope to entertain you with a mere- 
ly humourous or facetious story. Harlequin without his 
mask is known to present a very sober countenance, and 
was himself, the story goes, the melancholy patient whom 
the Doctor advised to go and see Harlequin' — a man full 
of cares and perplexities like the rest of us, whose Self must 
always be serious to him, under whatever mask, or disguise, 
or uniform he presents it to the public. And as all of you 
here must needs be grave when you think of your own past 
and present, you will not look to find, in the histories of 
those whose lives and feelings I am going to try and de- 
scribe to you, a story that is otherwise than serious, and 
often very sad. If Humour only meant laughter, you would 

* The anecdote is frequently told of our performer, Rich. 



ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



scarcely feel more interest about humourous writers than 
about the private life of poor Harlequin just mentioned, 
who possesses in common with these the power of making 
you laugh. But the men regarding whose lives and stories 
your kind presence here shows that you have curiosity and 
sympathy, appeal to a great number of our other faculties, 
besides our mere sense of ridicule. The humourous writer 
professes to awaken and direct your love, your pity, your 
kindness — your scorn for untruth, pretension, imposture — 
your tenderness for the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the 
unhappy. To the best of his means and ability he com- 
ments on all the ordinary actions and passions of life al- 
most. He takes upon himself to be the week-day preacher, 
so to speak. Accordingly, as he finds, and speaks, and feels 
the truth best, we regard him, esteem him — sometimes love 
him. And, as his business is to mark other people's lives 
and peculiarities, we moralise upon his life when he is gone 
— and yesterday's preacher becomes the text for to-day's 
sermon. 

Of English parents, and of a good English family of cler- 
gymen,' Swift was born in Dublin in 1667, seven months 



1 He was from a younger branch of the Swifts of Yorkshire. His grandfather, 
the Rev. Thomas Swift, Vicar of Goodrich, in Herefordshire, suffered for his loy- 
alty in Charles I.'s time. That gentleman married Elizabeth Dryden, a member 
of the family of the poet. Sir Walter Scott gives, with his characteristic minute- 
ness in such points, the exact relationship between these famous men. Swift was 
" the son of Dryden's second cousin." Swift, too, was the enemy of Drj'den's rep- 
utation. Witness the " Battle of the Books :" — " The difference was greatest among 
the horse," says he of the modems, "where every private trooper pretended to the 
command, from Tasso and Milton to Dryden and Withers." And in " Poetry, a 
Rhapsody," he advises the poetaster to — 

" Read all the Prefaces of Dryden, 
For these our critics much confide in, 



SWIFT. 7 

after the death of his father, who had come to practise there 
as a lawyer. The hoy went to school at Kilkenny, and aft- 
erwards to Trinity College, Dublin, where he got a degree 
with difficulty, and was wild, and witty, and poor. In 
1688, by the recommendation of his mother. Swift was re- 
ceived into the family of Sir William Temple, who had 
known Mrs. Swift in Ireland. He left his patron in 1693, 
and the next year took orders in Dublin. But he threw up 
the small Irish preferment which he got, and returned to 
Temple, in whose family he remained until Sir William's 
death in 1699. His hopes of advancement in England fail- 
ing. Swift returned to Ireland, and took the living of Lara- 
cor. Hither he invited Hester Johnson,' Temple's natural 
daughter, with whom he had contracted a tender friend- 
ship, while they were both dependants of Temple's. And 
with an occasional visit to England, Swift now passed nine 
years at home. 

In 1709 he came to England, and, with a brief visit to 
Ireland, during which he took possession of his deanery of 
St. Patrick, he now passed five years in England, taking 
the most distinguished part in the political transactions 
which terminated with the death of Q,ueen Anne. After 
her death, his party disgraced, and his hopes of ambition 
over. Swift returned to Dublin, where he remained twelve 
years. In this time he wrote the famous " Drapier's Let- 



Though merely writ, at first, for filling, 

To raise the volume's price a shilling." 
" Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet," was the phrase of Dryden to his kins- 
man, which remained alive in a memory tenacious of such matters. 

^ " Miss Hetty" she was called in the family, where her face, and her dress, and 
Sir William's treatment of her, all made the real fact about her birth plain enough 
Sir William left her a thousand pounds. 



ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



ters" and " Gulliver's Travels." He married Hester John- 
son, Stella, and buried Esther Vanhomrigh, Vanessa, who 
had followed him to Ireland from London, where she had 
contracted a violent passion for him. In 1726 and 1727 
Swift was in England, which he quitted for the last time 
on hearing of his wife's illness. Stella died in January, 
1728, and Swift not until 1745, having passed the last five 
Df the seventy-eight years of his life, with an impaired in- 
tellect and keepers to watch him.' 

You know, of course, that Swift has had many biogra- 
phers ; his life has been told by the kindest and most good- 
natured of men, Scott, who admires but cannot bring him- 
self to love him, and by stout old Johnson," who, forced to 



Sometimes, during his mental affliction, he continued walking about the house 
for many consecutive hours ; sometimes he remained in a kind of torpor. At times, 
he would seem to strviggle to bring into distinct consciousness, and shape into ex- 
pression, the intellect that lay smothering under gloomy obstruction in him. A pier- 
glass falling by accident, nearly fell on him. He said, he wished it had ! He once 
repeated, slowly, several times, " I am what I am." The last thing he wrote was 
an epigram on the building of a magazine for arms and stores, which was pointed 
out to him as he went abroad during his mental disease : — 

Behold a proof of Irish sense : 
Here Irish wit is seen ; 

When nothing's left that's worth defence, 
They build a magazine ! 
' Besides these famous books of Scott's and Johnson's, there is a copious " Life" 
by Thomas Sheridan (Dr. Johnson's " Sherry"), father of Richard Brinsley, and son 
of that good-natured, clever, Irish, Dr. Thomas Sheridan, Swift's intimate, who lost 
his chaplaincy by so unluckily choosing for a text on the king's birthday, " Sufficient 
for the day is the evil thereof!" Not to mention less important works, there is also 
the " Remarks on the Life and writings of Dr. Jonathan Swift," by that polite and 
dignified writer, the Earl of Orrer>'. His lordship is said to have striven for literary- 
renown, chiefly that he might make up for the slight passed on him by his father, 
who left his library away from him. It is to be feared that the ink he used to wash 
out that stain only made it look bigger. He had, however, known Swift, and cor- 
responded with people who knew him. Hia work (which appeared in 1751) pro- 



SWIFT. 

admit him into the company of poets, receives the famons 
Irishman, and takes off his hat to him with a bow of surly 
recognition, scans him from head to foot, and passes over to 
the other side of the street. Dr. Wilde of Dublin," who has 
written a most interesting volume on the closing years of 
Swift's life, calls Johnson " the most malignant of his biog- 
raphers :" it is not easy for an English critic to please Irish- 
men — perhaps to try and please them. And yet Johnson 
truly admires Swift : Johnson does not quarrel with Swift's 
change of politics, or doubt his sincerity of religion : about 
the famous Stella and Vanessa controversy the Doctor does 
not bear very hardly on Swift. But he could not give the 
Dean that honest hand of his ; the stout old man puts it 
into his breast, and moves off from him.° 

Would we have liked to live with him ? That is a ques- 
tion which, in dealing with these people's works, and think- 
ing of their lives and peculiarities, every reader of biogra- 
phies must put to himself. Would you have liked to be a 



yoked a good deal of controversy, calling out, among other brochures, the interesting 
"Observations on Lord Orrery's Remarks," &c. of Dr. Delany. 

' Dr. Wilde's book was written on the occasion of the remains of Swift and Stel- 
la being brought to the light of day — a thing which happened in 1835, when certain 
works going on in St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, afforded an opportunity of their 
being examined. One hears with surprise of these skulls " going the rounds" of 
houses, and being made the objects oi dilettante curiosity. The lar)mx of Swift was 
actually carried off ! Phrenologists had a low opinion of his intellect, from the ob- 
servations they took. 

Dr. Wilde traces the symptoms of ill health in Swift, as detailed in his writings 
from time to time. He observes, likewise, that the skull gave evidence of "diseased 
action" of the brain during life — such as would be produced by an increasing tend- 
ency to " cerebral congestion." 

' " He [Dr. Johnson] seemed to me to have an unaccountable prejudice against 
Swift ; for I once took the liberty to ask him if Swift had personally offended him, 
and he told me he had not." — Boswell's Tour to the Hebrides. 

A2 



10 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

friend of the great Dean ? I should like to have been Shaks- 
peare's shoeblack — just to have lived in his house, just to 
have worshipped him — to have run on his errands, and seen 
that sweet serene face. I should like, as a young man, to 
have lived on Fielding's stair-case in the Temple, and after 
helping him up to bed perhaps, and opening his door with 
his latch-key, to have shaken hands with him in the morn- 
ing, and heard him talk and crack jokes over his breakfast 
and his mug of small beer. "Who would not give some- 
thing to pass a night at the club with Johnson, and G-old- 
smith, and James Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck? The 
charm of Addison's companionship and conversation has 
passed to us by fond tradition — but Swift ? If you had 
been his inferior in parts (and that, with a great respect for 
all persons present, I fear is only very likely), his equal in 
mere social station, he would have bullied, scorned, and in- 
sulted you ; if, undeterred by his great reputation, you had 
met him like a man, he would have quailed before you,' 



I Few men, to be sure, dared this experiment, but yet their success was encoura- 
ging. One gentleman made a point of asking the Dean, whether his uncle Godwin 
had not given him his education. Swift, who hated that subject cordially, and, in- 
deed, cared little for his kindred, said, sternly, " Yes ; he gave me the education of 
a dog." " Then, sir," cried the other, striking his fist on the table, " you have not 
the gratitude of a dog !" 

Other occasions there were when a bold face gave the Dean pause, even after his 
Irish almost-royal position was established. But he brought himself into greater 
danger on a certain occasion, and the amusing circumstances may be once more re- 
peated here. He had unsparingly lashed the notable Dublin lawyer, Mr. Serjeant 
Bettesworth — 

" So, at the bar, the booby Bettesworth, 

Though half-a-crown out-pays his sweat's worth, 

Who knows in law nor text nor margent, 

Calls Singleton his brother-serjeant !" 
The Serjeant, it is said, swore to have his life. He presented himself at the dean- 
ery. The Dean asked his name. " Sir, I am Serjeant Bett-es-worth," 



SWIFT. 11 

and not had the pluck to reply, and gone home, and years 
after written a foul epigram about you — watched for you 
in a sewer, and come out to assail you with a coward's blow 
and ,a dirty bludgeon. If you had been a lord with a blue 
riband, who flattered his vanity, or could help his ambition, 
he would have been the most delightful company in the 
world. He would have been so manly, so sarcastic, so 
bright, odd, and original, that you might think he had no 
object in view but the indulgence of his humour, and that 
he was the most reckless, simple creature in the world. 
How he would have torn your enemies to pieces for you ! 
and made fun of the Opposition ! His servility was so 
boisterous that it looked like independence ;' he would have 
done your errands, but with the air of patronising you, and 
after fighting your battles masked in the street or the press, 
would have kept on his hat before your wife and daughters 
in the drawing-room, content to take that sort of pay for 
his tremendous services as a bravo.'' 



^^ In what regiment, pray ?" asked Swift. 

A guard of volunteers formed themselves to defend the Dean this time. 

1 " But, my Hamilton, I will never hide the freedom of my sentiments from you. 
I am much inclined to believe that the temper of my friend Swift might occasion his 
English friends to wish him happily and properly promoted at a distance. His 
spirit, for I would give it the proper name, was ever untraclable. The motions of 
his genius were often irregular. He assumed more the air of a patron than of a 
friend. He affected rather to dictate than advise." — Orrery. 

'...." An anecdote which, though only told by Mrs. Pilkington, is well attest- 
ed, bears, that the last time he was in London he went to dine with the Earl of 
Burlington, who was but newly married. The Earl, it is supposed, being willing to 
have a little diversion, did not introduce him to his lady, nor mention his name. 
After dinner, said the Dean, ' Lady Burlington, I hear you can sing ; sing me a song.' 
The lady looked on this unceremonious manner of asking a favour with distaste, and 
positively refused. He said ' She should sing, or he would make her. Why, madam, 
I suppose you take me for one of your poor English hedge-parsons ; sing when I bid 
you.' As the Earl did nothing but laugh at this freedom, the lady was so vexed that 



IS ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

He says as much himself in one of his letters to Boling- 
broke : — " All my endeavours to distinguish myself were 
only for want of a great title and fortune, that I might be 
used like a lord by those who have an opinion of my parts ; 
whether right or wrong is no great matter. And so the 
reputation of wit and great learning does the office of a 
blue riband or a coach and six.'" 

Could there be a greater candour? It is an outlaw, 
who says, " These are my brains ; with these I'll win titles 
and compete with fortune. These are my bullets ; these 
I'll turn into gold ;" and he hears the sound of coaches and 
six, takes the road like Macheath, and makes society stand 
and deliver. They are all on their knees before him. Down 
go my lord bishop's apron, and his G-r ace's blue riband, and 
my lady's brocade petticoat in the mud. He eases the one 
of a living, the other of a patent place, the third of a little 
snug post about the Court, and gives them over to followers 



she burst into tears and retired. His first compliment to her when he saw her 
again was, ' Pray, madam, are you as proud and ill-natured now as when I saw you 
last V To which she answered with great good-humour, ' No, Mr. Dean, I'll sing 
for you if you please.' From which time he conceived a great esteem for her." — 
Scott's Life. 

. . . . " He had not the least tincture of vanity in his conversation. He was, 
perhaps, as he said himself, too proud to be vain. When he was polite, it was in a 
manner entirely his own. In his friendships he was constant and undisguised. He 
was the same in his enmities." — Orrery. 

* " I make no figure but at court, where I affect to turn from a lord to the mean- 
est of my acquaintances." — Journal to Stella. 

" I am plagued with bad authors, verse and prose, who send me their books and 
poems, the vilest I ever saw ; but I have given their names to my man, never to let 
them see me." — Journal to Stella. 

The following curious paragraph illustrates the life of a courtier : — 

" Did I ever tell you that the Lord Treasurer hears ill with the left ear just as I 

do ? I dare not tell him that I am so, sir; for fear hi should think that 1 

tounttrfeited to make my court /" — Journal to Stella. 



SWIFT. 13 

of his own. The great prize has not come yet. The coach 
with the mitre and crozier in it, which he intends to have 
for his share, has been delayed on the way from St. James's : 
and he waits and waits until nightfall, when his runners 
come and tell him that the coach has taken a different 
road, and escaped him. So he fires his pistols into the air 
with a curse, and rides away into his country.' 



' The war of pamphlets was carried on fiercely on one side and the other; and 
the Whig attacks made the ministry Swift served very sore. Bolingbroke laid hold 
of several of the Opposition pamphleteers, and bewails their " factiousness" in the 
following letter : 

"Bolingbroke to the Eael of Straffokd. 

" Whitehall, July 23rd, 1712. 

" It is a melancholy consideration that the laws of our country are too weak to 
punish effectually those factious scribblers, who presume to blacken the brightest 
characters, and to give even scurrilous language to those who are in the first degrees 
of honour. This, my lord, among others, is a symptom of the decayed condition of 
our government, and serves to show how fatally we mistake licentiousness for lib- 
erty. All I could do was to take up Hart, the printer, to send him to Newgate, and 
to bind him over upon bail to be prosecuted ; this I have done, and if I can arrive at 
legal proof against the author Ridpath, he shall have the same treatment." 

Swift was not behind his illustrious friend in this virtuous indignation. In the 
history of the four last years of the Queen, the Dean speaks in the most edifying 
manner of the licentiousness of the press and the abusive language of the othei 
party: 

" It must be acknowledged that the bad practices of printers have been such as 

to deserve the severest animadversion from the public The adverse party, 

full of rage and leisure since their fall, and unanimous in their cause, employ a set 
of writers by subscription who are well versed in all the topics of defamation and 
have a style and genius levelled to the generality of their readers How- 
ever, the mischiefs of the press were too exorbitant to be cured by such a remedy 
as a tax upon small papers, and a bill for a much more effectual regulation of it was 
brought into the House of Commons, but so late in the session that there was no 
time to pass it, for there always appeared an unwillingness to cramp overmuch the 
liberty of the press." 

But to a clause in the proposed bill, that the names of authors should be set to 
every printed book, pamphlet, or paper, his reverence objects altogether, for, says 
he, " beside the objection to this clause from the practice of pious men, who, in 
publishing excellent writings for the service of religion, have chosen, out of an hum- 



14 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Swift's seems to me to be as good a name to point a 
moral or adorn a tale of ambition, as any hero's that ever 
lived and failed. But we must remember that the morality 
was lax, — that other gentlemen besides himself took the 
road in his day, — that public society was in a strange dis- 
ordered condition, and the State was ravaged by other con- 
dottieri. The Boyne was being fought and won, and lost 
— ^the bolls rung in William's victory, in the very same 
tone with which they would have pealed for James's. Men 
were loose upon politics, and to shift for themselves. They, 
as well as old beliefs and institutions, had lost their moor- 
ings and gone adrift in the storm. As in the South Sea 
Bubble almost everybody gambled ; as in the Railway 

ble Christian spirit, to conceal their names ; it is certain that all persons of true ge- 
nius or knowledge have an invincible modesty and suspicion of themselves upon 
their first sending their thoughts into the world." 

This " invincible modesty" was no doubt the sole reason which induced the Dean 
to keep the secret of the " Drapier's Letters," and a hundred humble Christian 
works of which he was the author. As for the Opposition, the Doctor was for deal- 
ing severely with them : he writes to Stella: — 

Journal. Letter XIX. 

"London, March 25th, HIO-IL 

<' We have let Guiscard be buried at last, after showing him pickled 

in a trough this fortnight for twopence a piece ; and the fellow that showed would 
point to his body and say, ' See, gentlemen, this is the wound that was given him 
by his Grace the Duke of Ormond ;' and, ' This is the wound,' &c. ; and then the 
show was over, and another set of rabble came in. 'Tis hard that our laws would 
not suffer us to hang his body in chains, because he was not tried ; and in the eye 

of the law every man is innocent till then." 

******* 

Journal. Letter XXVII. 

"London, July 25th, 1711. 
" I was this afternoon with Mr. Secretary at his office, and helped to hinder a 
man of his pardon, who is condemned for a rape. The Under Secretary was will- 
ing to save him ; but I told the Secretary he could not pardon him without a fa- 
vourable report from the Judge ; besides, he was a fiddler, and consequently a 
rogue, and deserved hanging for something else ; and so he shall swing." 



SWIFT. 15 

mania — not many centuries ago — almost every one took 
his unlucky share ; a man of that time, of the vast talents 
and amhition of Swift, could scarce do otherwise than grasp 
at his prize, and make his spring at his opportunity. His 
bitterness, his scorn, his rage, his subsequent misanthropy, 
are ascribed by some panegyrists to a deliberate conviction 
of mankind's unworthiness, and a desire to amend them by 
castigating. His youth was bitter, as that of a great genius 
bound down by ignoble ties, and powerless in a mean de- 
pendence ; his age was bitter,* like that of a great genius 
that had fought the battle and nearly won it, and lost it, 
and thought of it afterwards writhing in a lonely exile. A 
man may attribute to the gods, if he likes, what is caused 
by his own fury, or disappointment, or self-will. What 
public man — what statesman projecting a coup — what king 
determined on an invasion of his neighbour — what satirist 
meditating an onslaught on society or an individual, cannot 
give a pretext for his move ? There was a French general 
the other day who proposed to march into this country and 
put it to sack and pillage, in revenge for humanity out- 
raged by our conduct at Copenhagen, — there is always 
some excuse for men of the aggressive turn. They are of 
their nature warlike, predatory, eager for fight, plunder, 
dominion.* As fierce a beak and talon as ever struck — as 
strong a wing as ever beat, belonged to Swift. I am glad, 



1 It was his constant practice to keep his birth-day as a day of mourning. 

* " These devils of Grub-street rogues, that write the Flying- Post and Medley in 
one paper, will not be quiet. They are always mauling Lord Treasurer, Lord Bo- 
lingbroke, and me. We have the dog under prosecution, but Bolingbroke is not act- 
ive enough ; but I hope to swinge him. He is a Scotch rogue, one Ridpath. They 
get out upon bail, and write on. We take them again, and get fresh bail ; so it goes 
round." — Journal to Stella. 



16 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

for one, that fate wrested the prey out of his claws, and cut 
his wings and chained him. One can gaze, and not with- 
out awe and pity, at the lonely eagle chained behind the 
bars. 

That Swift was born at No. 7, Hoey's-court, Dublin, on 
the 30th November, 1667, is a certain fact, of which no- 
body will deny the sister island the honour and glory ; but, 
it seems to me, he was no more an Irishman than a man 
born of English parents at Calcutta is a Hindoo,* Grold- 
smith was an Irishman, and always an Irishman : Steele 
was an Irishman, and always an Irishman : Swift's heart 
was English and in England, his habits English, his logic 

1 Swift was by no means inclined to forget such considerations ; and his English 
birth makes its mark, strikingly enough, every now and then in his writings. Thus 
in a letter to Pope (Scott's Swift, vol. xix. p. 97), he says — 

"We have had your volume of letters Some of those who highly value 

you, and a few who know you personally, are grieved to find you make no distinc- 
tion between the English gentry of this kingdom, and the savage old Irish (who are 
only the vulgar, and some gentlemen who live in the Irish parts of the kingdom) ; 
but the English colonics, who are three parts in four, are much more civilized than 
many counties in England, and speak better English, and are much better bred." 

And again, in the fourth Drapier's Letter, we have the following: — 

" A short paper, printed at Bristol, and reprinted here, reports Mr. Wood to say 
'that he wonders at the impudence and insolence of the Irish, in refusing his coin.' 
When by the way, it is the true English people of Ireland who refuse it, although 
we take it for granted that the Irish will do so too whenever they are asked." — 
Scott's Swift, vol. iv. p. 143. 

He goes further, in a good-humoured satirical paper, " On Barbarous Denomina- 
tions in Ireland," where (after abusing, as he was wont, the Scotch cadence, sls 
well as expression) he advances to the " Irish brogue," and speaking of the " cen- 
sure" which it brings down, says : — 

" And what is yet worse, it is too well known that the bad consequence of this 
opinion affects those among us who are not the least liable to such reproaches far- 
ther than the misfortune of being born in Ireland, although of English parents, and 
whose education has been chiefly in that kingdom." — Ibid, vol. vii. p. 149. 

But, indeed, if we are to make anything of Race at all, we must call that man an 
Englishman whose father comes from an old Yorkshire family, and his mother from 
an old Leicestershire one ! 



SWIFT. 17 

eminently English ; his statement is elaborately simple ; 
he shuns tropes and metaphors, and uses his ideas and 
words with a wise thrift and economy, as he used his 
money ; with which he could be generous and splendid 
upon great occasions, but which he husbanded when there 
was no need to spend it. He never indulges in needless 
extravagance of rhetoric, lavish epithets, profuse imagery. 
He lays his opinion before you with a grave simplicity and 
a perfect neatness.' Dreading ridicule, too, as a man of 
his humour — above all, an Englishman of his humour — 
certainly would, he is afraid to use the poetical power 
which he really possessed ; one often fancies in reading 
him that he dares not be eloquent when he might ; that 
he does not speak above his voice, as it were, and the tone 
of society. 

His initiation into politics, his knowledge of business, his 
knowledge of polite life, his acquaintance with literature 
even, which he could not have pursued very sedulously 
during that reckless career at Dublin, Swift got under the 
roof of Sir "William Temple. He was fond of telling in 
after life what quantities of books he devoured there, and 



' "The style of his conversation was very much of a piece with that of his writ- 
ings, concise and clear and strong. Being one day at a Sheriff's feast, who amongst 
other toasts called out to him, ' Mr. Dean, The trade of Ireland!' He answered 
quick : ' Sir, I drink no memories ! ' 

" Happening to be in company with a petulant young man who prided himself on 

saying pert things and who cried out — 'You must know, Mr. Dean, that 1 

set up for a wit ?' ' Do you so,' says the Dean, ' take my advice, and sit down 
again!' 

" At another time, being in company, where a lady whisking her long train [long 
trains were then in fashion] swept down a fine fiddle and broke it ; Swift cried out — 

" Mantua vae miserae nimium vicina Cremonse !" 
— Dr. Delany. Observations upon Lord Orrery's " Remarks, tj-c." in Swift. Lon- 
don, 1754. 



18 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

how King William taught him to cut asparagus in the 
Dutch fashion. It was at Shene and at Moor Park, with 
a salary of twenty pounds and a dinner at the upper serv- 
ants' table, that this great and lonely Swift passed a ten 
years' apprenticeship — wore a cassock that was only not a 
livery — bent down a knee as proud as Lucifer's to suppli- 
cate my lady's good graces, or run on his honour's errands.' 
It was here, as he was writing at Temple's table, or follow- 
ing his patron's walk, that he saw and heard the men who 
had governed the great world — measured himself "With 
them, looking up from his silent corner, guaged their brains, 
weighed their wits, turned them, and tried them, and 
marked them. Ah ! what platitudes he must have heard ! 
what feeble jokes! what pompous commonplaces! what 
small men they must have seemed under those enormous 
periwigs, to the swarthy, uncouth, silent Irish secretary. 
I wonder whether it ever struck Temple that that Irishman 
was his master ? I suppose that dismal conviction did not 
present itself under the ambrosial wig, or Temple could 
never have lived with Swift. Swift sickened, rebelled, left 
the service — ate humble pie and came back again ; and so 
for ten years went on, gathering learning, swallowing scorn, 
and submitting with a stealthy rage to his fortune. 

Temple's style is the perfection of practised and easy 
good-breeding. If he does not penetrate very deeply into 
a subject, he professes a very gentlemanly acquaintance 
with it ; if he makes rather a parade of Latin, it was the 



* " Don't you remember how I used to be in pain when Sir William Temple would 
look cold and out of humour for three or four days, and I used to suspect a hund- 
red reasons ? I have plucked up my spirits since then, faith ; he spoiled a fine 
gentleman." — Journal to Stella 



SWIFT. 19 

custom of his day, as it was the custom for a gentleman 
to envelope his head in a periwig and his hands in lace 
ruffles. If he wears buckles and square-toed shoes, he 
steps in them with a consummate grace, and you never 
hear their creak, or find them treading upon any lady's 
train or any rival's heels in the Court crowd. When that 
grows too hot or too agitated for him, he politely leaves it. 
He retires to his retreat of Shene or Moor Park ; and lets 
the King's party, and the Prince of Orange's party battle 
it out among themselves. He reveres the sovereign (and 
no man perhaps ever testified to his loyalty by so elegant 
a bow) : he admires the Prince of Orange ; but there is 
one person whose ease and comfort he loves more than all 
the princes in Christendom, and that valuable member of 
society is himself, Grulielmus Temple, Baronettus. One 
sees him in his retreat ; between his study-chair and his 
tulip beds,* clipping his apricots and pruning his essays, — 

' . . . . " The Epicureans were more intelligible in their notion, and fortunate 
in their expression, when they placed ^ man's happiness in the tranquillity of his 
mind and indolence of body ; for while we are composed of both, I doubt both must 
have a share in the good or ill we feel. As men of several languages say the same 
things in very different words, so in several ages, countries, constitutions of laws 
and religion, the same thing seems to be meant by very different expressions ; 
what is called by the Stoics apathy, or dispassion ; by the sceptics, indisturbance ; 
by the Molinists, quietism ; by common men, peace of conscience, — seems all 
to mean but great. For this reason Epicurus passed his life wholly in his 
garden : there he studied, there he exercised, there he taught his philosophy ; and, 
indeed, no other sort of abode seems to contribute so much to both the tranquillity 
of mind and indolence of body, which he made his chief ends. The sweetness of 
the air, the pleasantness of smell, the verdure of plants, the cleanness and light- 
ness of food, the exercise of working or walking; but, above all, the exemption 
from cares and solicitude, seem equally to favour and improve both contemplation 
and health, the enjoyment of sense and imagination, and thereby the quiet and 

ease both of the body and mind Where Paradise was has been much 

debated, and little agreed ; but what sort of place is meant by it may perhaps 
easier be conjectured. It seems to have been a Persian word, since Xenophon 



20 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

the statesman, the ambassador no more ; but the philoso- 
pher, the Epicurean, the fine gentleman and courtier at 
St. James's as at Shene ; where in place of kings and fair 
ladies, he pays his court to the Ciceronian majesty ; or 
walks a minuet with the Epic Muse ; or dallies by the 
south wall with the ruddy nymph of gardens. 

Temple seems to have received and exacted a prodigious 
deal of veneration from his household, and to have been 
coaxed, and warmed, and cuddled by the people round 
about him, as delicately as any of the plants which he 
loved. When he fell ill in 1693, the household was aghast 
at his indisposition ; mild Dorothea his wife, the best com- 
panion of the best of men — 

" Mild Dorothea, peaceful, wise, and great, 
Trembling beheld the doubtful hand of fate." 

As for Dorinda, his sister — 

" Those who would grief describe, might come and trace 
Its watery footsteps in Dorinda's face. 
To see her weep, joy every face forsook, 
And grief flung sables on each menial look. 
The humble tribe mourned for the quickening soul, 
That furnished life and spirit through the whole." 

Is not that line in which grief is described as putting the 

and other Greek authors mention it, as what was much in use and delight among 
the kings of those eastern countries. Strabo describing Jericho : ' Ibi est palme- 
tum, cui immixtae sunt etiam aliae stirpes hortenses, locus ferax palmis abundans, 
spatio stadiorum centum, totus irriguus, ibi est Regis Balsami paradisus.' " — Essay 
on Garde7is. 

In the same famous essay Temple speaks of a friend, whose conduct and pru- 
dence he characteristically admires. 

. . . . " I thought it very prudent in a gentleman of my friends in Stafford- 
shire, who is a great lover of his garden, to pretend no higher, though his soil be 
good enough, than to the perfection of plums ; and in these (by bestowing south 
walls upon them) he has very well succeeded, which he could never have done in 
attempts upon peaches and grapes ; and a good plum is certainly better than an ill 
peach." 



SWIFT. 21 

menials into a mourning livery, a fine image ? One of 
the menials wrote it, who did not like that Temple livery 
nor those twenty-pound wages. Cannot one fancy the 
uncouth young servitor, with downcast eyes, books and 
papers in hand, following at his Honour's heels in the 
garden walk ; or taking his Honour's orders as he stands 
by the great chair, where Sir William has the gout, and 
his feet all blistered with moxa ? When Sir William has 
the gout or scolds it must be hard work at the second 
table ;' the Irish Secretary owned as much afterwards : 
and when he came to dinner, how he must have lashed 
and growled and torn the household with his gibes and 



' Swift's Thoughts on Hanging. 
(Directions to Servants.) 

" To grow old in the office of a footman, is the highest of all indignities ; there- 
fore, when you find years coming on without hopes of a place at court, a command 
in the army, a succession to the stewardship, an employment in the revenue (which 
two last you cannot obtain without reading and writing), or running away with 
your master's niece or daughter, I directly advise you to go upon the road, which 
is the only post of honour left you : there you will meet many of your old com- 
rades, and live a short life and a merry one, and making a figure at your exit, 
wherein I will give you some instructions. 

" The last advice I give you relates to your behaviour when you are going to be 
hanged ; which, either for robbing your master, for house-breaking, or going upon 
the highway, or in a drunken quarrel by killing the first man you meet, may very 
probably be your lot, and is owing to one of these three qualities : either a love of 
good fellowship, a generosity of mind, or too much vivacity of spirits. Your good 
behaviour on this article will concern your whole community : deny the fact with 
all solemnity of imprecations : a hundred of your brethren, if they can be admitted, 
will attend about the bar, and be ready upon demand to give you a character before 
the Court ; let nothing prevail on you to confess, but the promise of a pardon for 
discovering your comrades : but I suppose all this to be in vain ; for if you escape 
now, your fate will be the same another day. Get a speech to be written by the 
best author of Newgate : some of your kind wenches will provide you with a hol- 
land shirt and white cap, crowned with a crimson or black ribbon : take leave 
cheerfully of all your friends in Newgate : mount the cart with courage ; fall on 
your knees ; lift up your eyes ; hold a book in your hands, although you cannot 



ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



scorn ! What would the steward say about the pride of 
them Irish schollards — and this one had got no great 
credit even at his Irish college, if the truth were known — 
and what a contempt his excellency's own gentleman 
must have had for Parson Teague from Dublin. (The 
valets and chaplains were always at war. It is hard to 
say which Swift thought the more contemptible). And 
what must have been the sadness, the sadness and terror, 
of the housekeeper's little daughter with the curling black 
ringlets and the sweet smiling face, when the secretary 
who teaches her to read and write, and whom she loves 
and reverences above all things — above mother, above 
mild Dorothea, above that tremendous Sir William in his 
square-toes and periwig, — when Mr. Sivift comes down 
from his master with rage in his heart, and has not a kind 
word even for little Hester Johnson ? 

Perhaps for the Irish secretary, his Excellency's con- 
descension was even more cruel than his frowns. Sir 
William loould perpetually quote Latin and the ancient 
classics a propos of his gardens and his Dutch statues and 
plates bandes, and talk about Epicurus and Diogenes 
Laertius, Julius Caesar, Semiramis, and the gardens of 
the Hesperides, Msecenas, Strabo describing Jericho, and 
the Assyrian kings. A propos of beans, he would men- 
tion Pythagoras's precept to abstain from beans, and that 
this precept probably meant that wise men should abstain 
from public affairs. He is a placid Epicurean ; he is a. 
Pythagorean philosopher ; he is a wise man — that is the 

read a word ; deny the fact at the gallows ; kiss and forgive the hangman, and so 
farewell ; you shall be buried in pomp at the charge of the fraternity : the surgeon 
shall not touch a Limb of you ; and your fame shall continue until a successor of 
equal renown succeeds in your place " 



SWIFT. ses 

deduction. Does not Swift think so ? One can imagine 
the downcast eyes lifted up for a moment, and the flash 
of scorn which they emit. Swift's eyes were as azure as 
the heaven ; Pope says nobly (as everything Pope said and 
thought of his friend was good and noble), " His eyes are 
as azure as the heavens, and have a charming archness in 
them." And one person in that household, that pompous 
stately kindly Moor Park, saw heaven nowhere else. 

But the Temple amenities and solemnities did not agree 
with Swift. He was half-killed with a surfeit of Shene 
pippins ; and in a garden-seat which he devised for him- 
self at Moor Park, and where he devoured greedily the 
stock of books within his reach, he caught a vertigo and 
deafness which punished and tormented him through life. 
He could not bear the place or the servitude. Even in 
that poem of courtly condolence, from which we have 
quoted a few lines of mock melancholy, he breaks out of 
the funereal procession with a mad shriek, as it were, and 
rushes away crying his own grief, cursing his own fate, 
foreboding madness, and forsaken by fortune, and even 
hope. 

I don't know anything more melancholy than the letter 
to Temple, in which, after having broke from his bondage, 
the poor wretch crouches piteously towards his cage again, 
and deprecates his master's anger. He asks for testimo- 
nials for orders. " The particulars required of me are 
what relate to morals and learning ; and the reasons of 
quitting your Honour's family — that is whether the last 
was occasioned by any ill action. They are left entirely 
to your Honour's mercy, though in the first I think I 
cannot reproach myself for anything further than for in- 



24 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

firmities. This is all I dare at present beg from your Hon- 
our, under circumstances of life not worth your regard : 
what is left me to wish (next to the health and prosperity 
of your Honour and family) is that Heaven would one 
day allow me the opportunity of leaving my acknowledg- 
ments at your feet. I beg my most humble duty and 
service be presented to my ladies, your Honour's lady and 
sister." — Can prostration fall deeper ? could a slave bow 
lower ?' 

Twenty years afterwards Bishop Kennet, describing 
the same man, says, " Dr. Swift came into the coffee- 
house and had a bow from everybody but me. When I 



• " He continued in Sir William Temple's house till the death of that great man." 
— Anecdotes of the Family of Swift, by the Dean. 

" It has since pleased God to take this great and good person to himself." — Pref- 
ace to Temple's Works. 

On all public occasions, Swift speaks of Sir William in the same tone. But the 
reader will better understand how acutely he remembered the indignities he suffered 
in his household, from the subjoined extracts from the Journal to Stella : — 

" I called at Mr. Secretary the other day, to see what the d ailed him on 

Sunday : I made him a very proper speech ; told him I observed he was much out 
of temper, that I did not expect he would tell me the cause, but would be glad to 
see he was in better ; and one thing I warned him of — never to appear cold to me, 
for I would not be treated like a schoolboy ; that I had felt too much of that in my 
life already" {meaning Sir William Temple), &c. &c. — Journal to Stella. 

" I am thinking what a veneration we used to have for Sir William Temple 
because he might have been secretary of state at fifty ; and here is a young fellow 
hardly thirty in that employment." — Ibid. 

" The Secretary is as easy with me as Mr. Addison was. I have often thought 
what a splutter Sir William Temple makes about being Secretary of State." — Ibid. 

" Lord Treasurer has had an ugly fit of the rheumatism, but is now quite well. 
I was playing at one-and-thirty with him and his family the other night. Be gave 
us all twelvepence apiece to begin with : it put me in mind of Sir William Tem- 
ple." — Ibid. 

" I thought I saw Jack Temple Inephew to Sir William,'] and his wife pass by 
me to-day in their coach ; but I took no notice of them, I am glad I have wholly 
shaken off that family."— <S. to S., Sept. 1710, 



SWIFT. 25 

came to the antechamber [at Co art] to wait before pray- 
ers, Dr. Swift was the principal man of talk and business. 
He was soliciting the Earl of Arran to speak to his brother, 
the Duke of Ormond, to get a place for a clergyman. He 
was promising Mr. Thorold to undertake, with my Lord 
Treasurer, that he should obtain a salary of 200/. per 
annum as member of the English Church at Rotterdam. 
He stopped F. Gwynne, Esq., going in to the Q,ueen with 
the red bag, and told him aloud, he had something to say 
to him from my Lord Treasurer. He took out his gold 
watch, and telling the time of day, complained that it was 
very late. A gentleman said he was too fast. ' How can I 
help it,' says the doctor, ' if the courtiers give me a watch 
that won't go right ?' Then he instructed a young no- 
bleman, that the best poet in England was Mr. Pope (a 
Papist), who had begun a translation of Homer into En- 
glish, for which he would have them all subscribe ; ' For,' 
says he, "he shall not begin to print till I have a thou- 
sand guineas for him." Lord Treasurer, after leaving the 
Queen, came through the room beckoning Dr. Swift to 
follow him, — both went off just before prayers." There's 
a little malice in the Bishop's "just before prayers." 

This picture of the great Dean seems a true one, and is 
harsh, though not altogether unpleasant. He was doing 
good, and to deserving men too, in the midst of these 



' " Swift must be allowed," says Dr. Johnson, " for a time, to have dictated the 
political opinions of the English nation." 

A conversation on the Dean's pamphlets excited one of the Doctor's liveliest 
sallies. " One, in particular, praised his ' Conduct of the Allies.' — Johnson . 

' Sir, his ' Conduct of the Allies' is a performance of very little ability 

Why, sir, Tom Davies might have written the 'Conduct of the Allies'"' — Bos- 
well's Life of Johnson. 

B 



id ENGLISH HG'MOURISTS. 

intrigues and triumphs. His journals and a thousand an- 
ecdotes of him relate his kind acts and rough manners. 
His hand was constantly stretched out to relieve an honest 
man — he was cautious about his money, but ready. — If 
you were in a strait, would you like such a benefactor ? 
I think I would rather have had a potato and a friendly 
word from G-oldsmith, than have been beholden to the 
Dean for a guinea and dinner.' He insulted a man as he 
served him, made women cry, guests look foolish, bvillied 
unlucky friends, and flung his benefactions into poor men's 
faces. No ; the Dean was no Irishman — no Irishman ever 
gave but with a kind word and a kind heart. 

It is told, as if it were to Swift's credit, that the Dean of 
St. Patrick's performed his family devotions every morning 
regularly, but with such secresy, that the guests in his 
house were never in the least aware of the ceremony. 
There was no need surely why a church dignitary should 
assemble his family privily in a crypt, and as if he was 



> " Whenever he fell into the company of any person for the first time, it was his 
custom to ti-y their tempers and disposition by some abrupt question that bore the 
appearance of rudeness. If this were well taken, and answered with good humour, 
he afterwards made amends by his civilities. But if he saw any marks of resent- 
ment, from alarmed pride, vanity, or conceit, he dropped all further intercourse with 
the party. This will be illustrated by an anecdote of that sort related by Mrs. Pil- 
kington. After supper, the Dean having decanted a bottle of wine, poured what 
remained into a glass, and seeing it was muddy, presented it to Mr. Pilkington to 
drink it. ' For,' said he, ' I always keep some poor parson to drink the foul wine 
for me.' Mr. Pilkington, entering into his humour, thanked him, and told him ' he 
did not know the difference, but was glad to get a glass at any rate.' ' Why then,' 

said the Dean, 'you sha'n't, for I'll drink it myself Why, take you, you are 

wiser than a paltry curate whom I asked to dine with me a few days ago ; for upon 
my making the same speech to him, he said, he did not understand such usage, and 
so walked off without his dinner. By the same token, I told the gentleman who 
recommended him to me, that the fellow was a blockhead, and I had done with 
him." — Sheridan's Life of Suiif/. 



SWIFT. 2/ 

afraid of heathen persecution. But I think the world was 
right, and the hishops who advised Q,ueen Anne, when 
they counselled her not to appoint the author of the " Tale 
of a Tub" to a bishopric, gave perfectly good advice. The 
man who wrote the arguments and illustrations in that 
wild book, could not but be aware what must be the se- 
quel of the propositions which he laid down. The boon 
companion of Pope and Bolingbroke, who chose these as the 
friends of his life, and the recipients of his confidence and 
affection, must have heard many an argument, and joined 
in many a conversation over Pope's port, or St. John's Bur- 
gundy, which would not bear to be repeated at other men's 
boards. 

I know of few things more conclusive as to the sincerity 
of Swift's religion than his advice to poor John Gay to turn 
clergyman, and look out for a seat on the Bench. Gray, 
the author of the " Beggar's Opera," — Gray, the wildest of 
the wits about town — it was this man that Jonathan Swift 
advised to take orders — to invest in a cassock and bands — 
just as he advised him to husband his shillings and put his 
thousand pounds out at interest.* The Q,ueen, and the 



' FROM THE ARCHBISHOP OF CASHELL. 

" Casheli, May 31»<, 1735. 
" Dear Sir, — 

" I have been so unfortunate in all my contests of late, that I am resolved 
to have no more, especially where I am likely to be overmatched ; and as I have 
some reason to hope what is past will be forgotten, I confess I did endeavour in my 
last to put the best colour I could think of upon a very bad cause. My friends 
judge right of my idleness ; but, in reality, it has hitherto proceeded from a hurry 
and confusion, arising from a thousand unlucky unforeseen accidents rather than 
mere sloth. I have but one troublesome affair now upon my hands, which, by 
the help of the prime serjeant, I hope soon to get rid of; and then you shall see 
me a true Irish bishop. Sir James Ware has made a very useful collection of 
the memorable actions of my predecessors. He tells me, they were bom in such 



28 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

bishops, and the world, were right in mistrusting the re- 
ligion of that man. 

1 am not here, of course, to speak of any man's religious 
views, except in so far as they influence his literary char- 
acter, his life, his humour. The most notorious sinners of 
all those fellow-mortals whom it is our business to discuss 
— Harry Fielding and Dick Steele, were especially loud, 
and I believe really fervent, in their expressions of belief; 
they belaboured freethinkers, and stoned imaginary atheists 

a town of England or Ireland ; were consecrated such a year ; and, if not trans- 
lated, were buried in the Cathedral church, either on the north or south side. 
Whence I conclude, that a good bishop has nothing more to do than to eat, drink, 
grow fat, rich, and die ; which laudable example I propose for the remainder of my 
life to follow ; for to tell you the truth, I have for these four or five years past met 
with so much treachery, baseness, and ingratitude among mankind, that I can hard- 
ly think it incumbent on any man to endeavour to do good to so perverse a genera- 
tion. 

" I am truly concerned at the account you give me of your health. Without 
doubt a southern ramble will prove the best remedy you can take to recover your 
flesh ; and I do not know, except in one stage, where you can choose a road so suited 
to your circumstances, as from Dublin hither. You have to Kilkenny a turnpike 
and good inns, at every ten or twelve miles end. From Kilkenny hither is twenty 
long miles, bad road, and no inns at all : but I have an expedient for you. At the 
foot of a very high hill, just midway, there lives in a neat thatched cabin, a parson, 
who is not poor ; his wife is allowed to be the best little woman in the world. Her 
chickens are the fattest, and her ale the best in all the country. Besides, the par- 
son has a little cellar of his own, of which he keeps the key, where he always hais 
a hogshead of the best wine that can be got, in bottles well corked, upon their side; 
and he cleans and pulls out the cork better, I think, then Robin. Here I design to 
meet you with a coach ; if you be tired, you shall stay all night ; if not, after din- 
ner we will set out about four, and be at Cashell by nine ; and by going through 
fields and by-ways, which the parson will show us, we shall escape all the rocky 
and stony roads that lie between this place and that, which are certainly very bad. 
I hope you will be so kind as to let me know a post or two before you set out, the 
very day you will be at Kilkenny, that I may have all things prepared for you. It 
may be, if you ask him. Cope will come : he will do nothing for me. Therefore, 
depending upon your positive promise, I shall add no more arguments to persuade 
you, and am, with the greatest truth, your most faithful and obedient servant, 

" Theo. Cashei.l." 



SWIFT. 29 

on all sorts of occasions, going out of their way to bawl 
their own creed, and persecute their neighbour's, and if 
they sinned and stumbled, as they constantly did with debt, 
with drink, with all sorts of bad behaviour, they got up on 
their knees, and cried " Peccavi" with a most sonorous 
orthodoxy. Yes ; poor Harry Fielding and poor Dick Steele 
were trusty and undoubting Church of England men ; they 
abhorred Popery, Atheism, and wooden shoes, and idola- 
tries in general ; and hiccupped Church and State with fer- 
vour. 

But Swift? His mind had had a different schooling, 
and possessed a very different logical power. He was not 
bred up in a tipsy guard-room, and did not learn to reason 
in a Covent Garden tavern. He could conduct an argument 
from beginning to end. He could see forward with a fatal 
clearness. In his old age, looking at the " Tale of a Tub," 
when he said, " Grood Grod, what a genius I had when I 
wrote that book !" 1 think he was admiring, not the genius, 
but the consequences to which the genius had brought 
him — a vast genius, a magnificent genius, a genius won- 
derfully bright, and dazzling, and strong, — to seize, to 
know, to see, to flash upon falsehood and scorch it into 
perdition, to penetrate into the hidden motives, and expose 
the black thoughts of men, — an awful, an evil spirit. 

Ah, man ! you, educated in Epicurean Temple's library, 
you whose friends were Pope and St. John — what made 
you to swear to fatal vows, and bind yourself to a life-long 
hypocrisy before the Heaven which you adored with such 
real wonder, humility, and reverence ? For Swift's was a 
reverent, was a pious spirit — for Swift could love and could 
pray. Through the storms and tempests of his furious 



30 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

mind, the stars of religion and love break out in the blue 
shining serenity, though hidden by the driving clouds and 
the maddened hurricane of his life. 

It is my belief that he suffered frightfully from the con- 
sciousness of his own scepticism, and that he had bent his 
pride so far down as to put his apostasy out to hire.' The 
paper left behind him, called "Thoughts on Religion," is 
merely a set of excuses for not professing disbelief. He 
says of his sermons that he preached pamphlets : they have 
scarce a Christian characteristic ; they might be preached 
from the steps of a synagogue, or the floor of a mosque, or 
the box of a coffee-house almost. There is little or no 
cant — he is too great and too proud for that ; and, in so far 
as the badness of his sermons goes, he is honest. But hav- 
ing put that cassock on, it poisoned him : he was strangled 
in his bands. He goes through life, tearing, like a man 
possessed with a devil. Like Abudah in the Arabian 
story, he is always looking out for the Fury, and knows 
that the night will come and the inevitable hag with it. 
What a night, my G-od, it was! what a lonely rage and 
long agony — what a vulture that tore the heart of that 
giant!" It is awful to think of the great sufferings of this 
great man. Through life he always seems alone, some- 
how. Goethe was so. I cannot fancy Shakspeare other- 



' "Mr. Swift lived with him [Sir William Temple] some time, but resolving to 
settle himself in some way of living, was inclined to take orders. However, al- 
though his fortune was very small, he had a scruple of entering into the Church 
merely for support.'' — Anecdotes of the Family of Swift, by the Dean. 

' " Dr. Swift had a natural severity of face, which even his smiles could never 
soften, or his utmost gaiety render placid and serene ; but when that sternness of vis- 
age was increased by rage, it is scarce possible to imagine looks or features that car- 
ried in them more terror and austerity." — Orrery. 



SWIFT 31 

wise. The giants must live apart. The kings can have 
no company. But this man suffered so ; and deserved so 
to suffer. One hardly reads anywhere of such a pain. 

The " ssBva indignatio" of which he spoke as lacerating 
his heart, and which he dares to inscribe on his tombstone 
— as if the wretch who lay under that stone waiting God's 
-judgment had a right to be angry — breaks out from him 
in a thousand pages of his writings, and tears and rends 
him. Against men in office, he having been overthrown ; 
against men in England, he having lost his chance of pre- 
ferment there, the furious exile never fails to rage and 
curse. Is it fair to call the famous "Drapier's Letters" 
patriotism ? They are master-pieces of dreadful humour 
and invective : they are reasoned logically enough too, but 
the proposition is as monstrous and fabulous as the Lil- 
liputian island. It is not that the grievance is so great, 
but there is his enemy — the assault is wonderful for its 
activity and terrible rage. It is Samson, with a bone in 
his hand, rushing on his enemies and felling them : one 
admires not the cause so much as the strength, the anger, 
the fury of the champion. As is the case with madmen, 
certain subjects provoke him, and awaken his fits of wrath. 
Marriage is one of these ; in a hundred passages in his writ- 
ings he rages against it ; rages against children — an object 
of constant satire, even more contemptible in his eyes than 
a lord's chaplain, is a poor curate with a large family. 
The idea of this luckless paternity never fails to bring down 
from him gibes and foul language. Could Dick Steele, or 
Goldsmith, or Fielding, in his most reckless moment of 
satire, have written anything like the Dean's famous "mod- 
est proposal" for eating children? Not one of these but 



32 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

melts at the thoughts of childhood, fondles and caresses 
it. Mr. Dean has no such softness, and enters the nursery 
with the tread and gaiety of an ogre.' "I have been as- 
sured," says he in the ".Modest. Proposal," "by a Very 
knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a 
young healthy child, well-nursed, is, at a year old, a most 
delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, 
roasted, baked, or boiled ; and I make no doubt it will 
equally serve in a ragouty And, taking up this pretty 
joke, as his way is, he argues it with perfect gravity and 
logic. 

r He turns and twists this subject in a score of different 
ways : he hashes it ; and he serves it up cold ; and he gar- 
nishes it ; and relishes it always. He describes the little 
animal as "dropped from its dam," advising that the mother 
should let it suck plentifully in the last month, so as to ren- 
der it plump and fat for a good table ! "A child," says his 
reverence, "will make two dishes at an entertainment for 
friends; and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind- 
quarter will make a reasonable dish," and so on; and, the 
subject being so delightful that he cannot leave it — he pro- 
ceeds to recommend, in place of venison for squires' tables, 
"the bodies of young lads and maidens not exceeding four- 
teen nor under twelve." Amiable humourist ! laughing 
castigator of morals ! There was a process well known and 
practised in the Dean's gay days : when a lout entered the 
coffee-house, the wags proceeded to what they called "roast- 

1 ''London, April 10th, 1713. 
" Lady Masham's eldest boy is very ill : I doubt he will not live, and she stays at 
Kensington to nurse him, which vexes us all. She is so excessively fond, it makes 
mo inad. She should never leave the Queen, but leave everything, to stick to what 
IS .so much the interest of the public, as well as her own " . . . . — Journal. 



SWIFT. 33 

ing" him. This is roasting a subject with a vengeance. 
The Dean had a native genius for it. As the "Almanach 
des Grourmands" says, On nait rStisseur. 

And it was not merely by the sarcastic method that 
Swift exposed the unreasonableness of loving and having 
children. In G-ulliver, the folly of love and marriage by 
graver arguments and advice. In the famous Lilliputian 
kingdom, Swift speaks with approval of the practice of in- 
stantly removing children from their parents and educating 
them by the State; and amongst his favourite horses, a 
pair of foals are stated to be the very utmost a well-regu- 
lated equine couple would permit themselves. In fact, our 
great satirist was of opinion that conjugal love was unad- 
visable, and illustrated the theory by his own practice and 
example — God help him — which made him about the most 
wretched being in Grod's world.* 

[~Tne grave and logical conduct of an absurd proposition, 
as exemplified in the cannibal proposal just mentioned, is 
our author's constant method through all his works of hu- 
mour, lijriven a country of people six inches or sixty feet 
high, and by the mere process of the logic, a thousand won- 
derful absurdities are evolved, at so many stages of the cal- 
culation. Turning to the first minister, who waited behind 
him with a white staff near as tall as the mainmast of the 
" Royal Sovereign," the king of Brobdignag observes how 
contemptible a thing human grandeur is, as represented by 
such a contemptible little creature as Gulliver. " The Em- 
peror of Lilliput's features are strong and masculine (what 
a surprising humour there is in this description I) — the Em- 

' " My health is somewhat mended, but at best I have an ill head and an aching 
heart."— /re May, 1719. 

B2 



84 E.NGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

peror's features," Grulliver says, "are strong and masculine, 
with an Austrian lip, an arched nose, his complexion olive, 
his countenance erect, his body and limbs well-proportioned, 
and his deportment majestic. He is taller by the breadth 
of my nail than any of his court, which alone is enough 
\__tp strike an awe into beholders." 

"What a surprising humour there is in these descrip- 
tions ! How noble the satire is here ! how just and honest ! 
How perfect the image ! Mr. Macaulay has quoted the 
charming lines of the poet, where the king of the pigmies 
is measured by the same standard. We have all read in 
Milton of the spear that was like " the mast of some tall 
amiral," but these images are surely likely to come to the 
comic poet originally. The subject is before him. He is 
turning it in a thousand ways. He is full of it. The fig- 
ure suggests itself naturally to him, and comes out of his 
subject, as in that wonderful passage, when G-ulliver's box 
having been dropped by the eagle into the sea, and Gulliver 
having been received into the ship's cabin, he calls upon 
the crew to bring the box into the cabin, and put it on the 
table, the cabin being only a quarter the size of the box. It 
is the veracity of the blunder which is so admirable. Had 
a man come from such a country as Brobdignag he would 
have blundered so. 

But the best stroke of humour, if there be a best in that 
ahounding book, is that where Grulliver, in the unpronounce- 
able country describes his parting from his master the 
horse.* "I took," he says, "a second leave of my master. 



* Perhaps the most melancholy satire in the whole of the dreadful book, is the 
description of the very old people in the voyage to Laputa. At Lugnag, Gulliver 
hears of some persons who never die, called the Struldbrugs, and expressing a wish 



SWIFT. 35 

but as I was going to prostrate myself to kiss his hoof, he 
did me the honour to raise it gently to my mouth. I am 

to become acquainted with men who must have so much learning and experience, his 
coUoquist describes the Struldbrugs to him. 

He said, " They commonly acted like mortals, till about thirty years old, after 
which, by degrees, they grew melancholy and dejected, increasing in both till they 
came to fourscore. This he learned from their own confession : for otherwise there 
not being above two or three of that species born in an age, they were too few to 
form a general observation by. When they come to fourscore years, which is reck- 
oned the extremity of living in this country, they had not only all the follies and in- 
firmities of other old men, but many more, which arose from the prospect of never 
dying. They were not only opinionative, peevish, covetous, morose, vain, talkative, 
but incapable of friendship, and dead to all natural affection, which never descend- 
ed below their grandchildren. Envy and impotent desires are their prevailing pas- 
sions. But those objects against which their envy seems principally directed, are 
the vices of the younger sort and the deaths of the old. By reflecting on the former, 
they find themselves cut ofT from all possibility of pleasure ; and whenever they see 
a funeral, they lament and repent that others are gone to a harbour of rest, to which 
they themselves never can hope to arrive. They have no remembrance of anything 
but what they learned and observed in their youth and middle age, and even that is 
very imperfect. And for the truth or particulars of any fact, it is safer to depend on 
common tradition than upon their best recollections. The least miserable among 
them appear to be those who turn to dotage, and entirely lose their memories ; these 
meet with more pity and assistance, because they want many bad qualities which 
abound in others. 

" If a Struldbrug happened to marry one of his own kind, the marriage is dissolved 
of course, by the courtesy of the kingdom, as soon as the younger of the two comes 
to be fourscore. For the law thinks it to be a reasonable indulgence that those who 
are condemned, without any fault of their own, to a perpetual continuance in the 
world, should not have their misery doubled by the load of a wife. 

" As soon as they have completed the terra of eighty years, they are looked on as 
dead in law ; their heirs immediately succeed to their estates, only a small pittance 
is reserved for their support ; and the poor ones are maintained at the public charge. 
After that period, they are held incapable of any employment of trust or profit, they 
cannot purchase lands or take leases, neither are they allowed to be witnesses in 
any cause, either civil or criminal, not even for the decision of meers and bounds. 

" At ninety they lose their teeth and hair ; they have at that age no distinction 
of taste, but eat and drink whatever they can get without relish or appetite. The 
diseases they were subject to still continue, without increasing or diminishing. In 
talking, they forget the common appellation of things, and the names of persons, 
even of those who are their nearest friends and relatives. For the same reason, 
they can never amuse themselves with reading, because their memory will not serve 



36 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

not ignorant how much I have been censured for mention- 
ing this last particular. Detractors are pleased to think it 
improbable that so illustrious a person should descend to 
give so great a mark of distinction to a creature so inferior 
as I. Neither am I ignorant how apt some travellers are 
to boast of extraordinary favours they have received. But 
if these censurers were better acquainted with the noble 
and courteous disposition of the Houyhnhnms they would 
soon change their opinion." 

The surprise here, the audacity of circumstantial evi- 



to carry them from the beginning of a sentence to the end ; and by this defect they 
are deprived of the only entertainment whereof they might otherwise be capable. 

" The language of this country being always on the flux, the Struldbrugs of one 
age do not understand those of another ; neither are they able, after two hundred 
years, to hold any conversation (further than by a few general words) with their 
neighbours, the mortals ; and thus they lie under the disadvantage of living like for- 
eigners in their own country. 

" This was the account given me of the Struldbrugs, as near as I can remember. 
I afterwards saw five or six of different ages, the youngest not above two hundred 
years old, who were brought to me several times by some of my friends ; but al- 
though they were told ' that I was a great traveller, and had seen all the world,' 
they had not the least curiosity to ask me a single question ; only desired I would 
give them slumskudask, or a token of remembrance ; which is a modest way of beg- 
ging, to avoid the law that strictly forbids it, because they are provided for by the 
public, although indeed with a very scanty allowance. 

" They are despised and hated by all sorts of people ; when one of them is 
bom, it is reckoned ominous, and their birth is recorded very particularly ; so that 
you may know their age by consulting the register, which, however, has not been 
kept above a thousand years past, or at least has been destroyed by time or public 
disturbances. But the usual way of computing how old they are, is by asking 
liiem what kings or great persons they can remember, and then consulting history ; 
for infallibly the last prince in their mind did not begin his reign after they were 
fourscore years old. 

" They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld, and the women more hor- 
rible than the men ; besides the usual deformities in extreme old age, they acquired 
an additional ghastliness, in proportion to their number of years, which is not to be 
described ; and among half a dozen, I soon distinguished which was the eldest, al- 
though there was not above a century or two between them." — Gulliver's Travels. 



SWIFT. 37 

dence, the astounding gravity of the speaker, who is not 
ignorant how much he has been censured, the nature of 
the favour conferred, and the respectful exultation at the 
receipt of it, are surely complete ; it is truth topsy-turvy, 
entirely logical and absurd. 

As for the humour and conduct of this famous fable, I 
suppose there is no person who reads but must admire ; as 
for the moral, I think it horrible, shameful, unmanly, blas- 
phemous ; and giant and great as this Dean is, I say we 
should hoot him. Some of this audience may not have read 
the last part of G-ulliver, and to such I would recal the ad- 
vice of the venerable Mr. Punch to persons about to marry, 
and say "Don't." When Gulliver first lands among the 
Yahoos, the naked howling wretches clamber up trees and 
assault him, and he describes himself as "almost stifled 
with the filth which fell about him." The reader of the 
fourth part of Gulliver's Travels is like the hero himself in 
this instance. It is Yahoo language ; a monster gibbering 
shrieks, and gnashing imprecations against mankind, — 
tearing down all shreds of modesty, past all sense of man- 
liness and shame ; filthy in word, filthy in thought, furious, 
raging, obscene. 

And dreadful it is to think that Swift knew the tendency 
of his creed — the fatal rocks towards which his logic des- 
perately drifted. That last part of Gulliver is only a con- 
sequence of what has gone before ; and the worthlessness 
of all mankind, the pettiness, cruelty, pride, imbecility, the 
general vanity, the foolish pretension, the mock greatness, 
the pompous dulness, the mean aims, the base successes — 
all these were present to him ; it was with the din of these 
curses of the world, blasphemies against Heaven, shrieking 



38 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

in his ears, that he began to write his dreadful allegory — 
of which the meaning is that man is utterly wicked, despe- 
rate, and imbecile, and his passions are so monstrous, and 
his boasted powers so mean, that he is and deserves to be 
the slave of brutes, and ignorance is better than his vaunted 
reason. What had this man done ? What secret remorse 
was rankling at his heart, what fever was boiling in him, 
that he should see all the world blood-shot ? We view the 
world with our own eyes, each of us; and we make from 
within us the world we see. A weary heart gets no glad- 
ness out of sunshine; a selfish man is sceptical about 
friendship, as a man with no ear does not care for music. 
A frightful self-consciousness it must have been, which 
looked on mankind so darkly through those eyes of Swift. 

A remarkable story is told by Scott, of Delany, who in- 
terrupted Archbishop King and Swift in a conversation 
which left the prelate in tears, and from which Swift 
rushed away with marks of strong terror and agitation in 
his countenance, upon which the archbishop said to De- 
lany, '' You have just met the most unhappy man on 
earth ; but on the subject of his wretchedness you must 
never ask a question." 

The most unhappy man on earth ; — Miserrimus — what 
a character of him ! And at this time all the great wits 
of England had been at his feet. All Ireland had shouted 
after him, and worshipped as a liberator, a saviour, the 
greatest patriot and citizen. Dean Drapier BickerstafF 
G-uUiver — the most famous statesmen, and the greatest 
poets of his day, had applauded him, and done him hom- 
age, and at this time writing over to Bolingbroke, from 
Ireland, he says, " It is time for me to have done with the 



SWIFT. 39 

world, and so I would if I could get into a better before I 
was called into the best, and not to die here in a rage, 
like a poisoned rat in a holeP 

We have spoken about the men, and Swift's behaviour 
to them ; and now it behoves us not to forget that there 
are certain other persons in the creation who had rather 
intimate relations with the great Dean.' Two women 
whom he loved and injured are known by every reader of 
books so familarily that if we had seen them, or if they 
had been relatives of our own, we scarcely could have 
known them better. Who has not in his mind an image 
of Stella ? Who does not love her ? Fair and tender 
creature : pure and affectionate heart I Boots it to you 
now that you have been at rest for a hundred and twenty 
years, not divided in death from the cold heart which 
caused yours, whilst it beat, such faithful pangs of love 
and grief — boots it to you now, that the whole world loves 



1 The name of Varina has been thrown into the shade by those of the famous 
Stella and Vanessa ; but she had a story of her own to tell about the blue eyes of 
young Jonathan. One may say that the book of Swift's Life opens at places kept 
by these blighted flowers ! Varina must have a paragraph. 

She was a Miss Jane Waryng, sister to a college chum of his. In 1696, when 
Swift was nineteen years old, we find him writing a love-letter to her, beginning, 
" Impatience is the most inseparable quality of a lover." But absence made a 
great difference in his feelings ; so, four years afterwards, the tone is changed. 
He writes again, a very curious letter, offering to marry her, and putting the offer 
in such a way that nobody could possibly accept it. 

After dwelling on his poverty, &c., he says, conditionally, " I shall be blessed to 
have you in my arras, without regarding whether your person be beautiful, or your 
fortune large. Cleanliness in the first, and competency in the second, is all I ask 
for !" 

The editors do not tell us what became of Varina in life. One would be glad to 
know that she met with some worthy partner, and lived long enough to see her 
little boys laughing over Lilliput, without any arriere pensee of a sad character 
about the great Dean ! 



40 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

and deplores you ? Scarce any man, I believe, ever 
thought of that grave, that did not cast a flower of pity- 
on it, and write over it a sweet epitaph. Gentle lady ! — 
so lovely, so loving, so unhappy. You have had countless 
champions, millions of manly hearts mourning for you 
From generation to generation we take up the fond tradi- 
tion of your beauty ; we watch and follow your story, 
your bright morning love and purity, your constancy, 
your grief, your sweet martyrdom. We knew your legend 
by heart. You are one of the saints of English story. 

And if Stella's love and innocence is charming to con- 
template, I will say that in spite of ill-usage, in spite of 
drawbacks, in spite of mysterious separation and union, of 
hope delayed and sickened heart — in the teeth of Vanessa, 
and that little episodical aberration which plunged Swift 
into such woeful pitfalls and quagmires of amorous per- 
plexity — in spite of the verdicts of most women, I believe, 
who, as far as my experience and conversation goes, gen- 
erally take Vanessa's part in the controversy — in spite of 
the tears which Swift caused Stella to shed, and the rocks 
and barriers which fate and temper interposed, and which 
prevented the pure course of that love from running 
smoothly ; the brightest part of Swift's story, the pure star 
in that dark and tempestuous life of Swift's, is his love for 
Hester Johnson. It has been my business, professionally 
of course, to go through a deal of sentimental reading in 
my time, and to acquaint myself with love-making, as it 
has been described in various languages, and at various 
ages of the world ; and I know of nothing more manly, 
more tender, more exquisitely touching, than some of these 
brief notes, written in what Swift calls " his little Ian- 



SWIFT. 41 

guage" in his journal to Stella.' He writes to her night 
and morning often. He never sends away a letter to her 
tut he begins a new one on the same day. He cannot bear 
to let go her kind little hand as it were. He knows that 
she is thinking of him, and longing for him far away in 
Dublin yonder. He takes her letters from under his pillow 
and talks to them, familiarly, paternally, with fond epithets 
and pretty caresses — as he would to the sweet and artless 
creature who loved him. " Stay," he writes one morning 
— it is the 14th of December, 1710 — " Stay, I will answer 
some of your letter this morning in bed — let me see. 
Come and appear little letter ! Here I am, says he, and 
what say you to Stella this morning fresh and fasting ? 
And can Stella read this writing without hurting her dear 
eyes ?" He goes on, after more kind prattle and fond 
whispering. The dear eyes shine clearly upon him then 
— the good angel of his life is with him and blessing him. 
Ah, it was a hard fate that wrung from them so many 
tears, and stabbed pitilessly that pure and tender bosom. 
A hard fate : but would she have changed it? I have 
heard a woman say that she would have taken Swift's 
cruelty to have had his tenderness. He had a sort of 
worship for her whilst he wounded her. He speaks of her 

1 A sentimental Champollion might find a good deal of matter for his art, in ex- 
pounding the symbols of the "Little Language." Usually, Stella is " M.D.," but 
sometimes her companion, Mrs. Dingley, is included in it. Swift is "Presto ;" also 
P.D.F.R. We have " Good-night, M.D. ; Night, M.D. ; Little M.D. ; Stellakins ; 
Pretty Stella; Dear roguish, impudent, pretty M.D. !" Every now and then he 
breaks into rhyme, as — 

"I wish you both a merry new year, 

Roast beef, minced-pies, and good strong beer, 

And me a share of your good cheer, 

That I was there, as you were here, 

And you are a little saucy dear." 



42 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

after she is gone ; of her wit, of her kindness, of her grace, 
of her beauty, with a simple love and reverence that are 
indescribably touching ; in contemplation of her goodness 
his hard heart melts into pathos : his cold rhyme kindles 
and glows into poetry, and he falls down on his knees, so 
to speak, before the angel, whose life he had embittered, 
confesses his own wretchedness and unworthiness, and 
adores her with cries of remorse and love : — 

" When on my sickly couch I lay, 
Impatient both of night and day, 
And groaning in unmanly strains, 
Called every power to ease my pains, 
Then Stella ran to my relief. 
With cheerful face and inward grief. 
And though by Heaven's severe decree 
She suffers hourly more than me, 
No cruel master could require 
From slaves employed for daily hire, 
What Stella, by her friendship warmed, 
With vigour and delight performed. 
Now, with a soft and silent tread, 
Unheard she moves about my bed : 
My sinking spirits now supplies 
With cordials in her hands and eyes. 
Best pattern of true friends ! beware ; 
You pay too dearly for your care 
If, while your tenderness secures 
My life, it must endanger yours : 
For such a fool was never found 
Who pulled a palace to the ground, 
Only to have the ruins made 
Materials for a house decayed." 

One little triumph Stella had in her life — one dear little 
piece of injustice was performed in her favour, for which I 
confess, for my part, I cannot help thanking fate and the 
Dean. That other person was sacrificed to her — that — that 
young woman, who lived five doors from Dr. Swift's lodgings 



SWIFT. 43 

in Bury-street, and who flattered him, and made love to him 
in such an outrageous manner — Vanessa was thrown over. 
Swift did not keep Stella's letters to him in reply to those 
he wrote to her.' He kept Bolinghroke's, and Pope's, and 
Harley's, and Peterborough's : but Stella, "very carefully," 
the Lives say, kept Swift's. Of course : that is the way of 



1 The following passages are from a paper begun by Swift on the evening of the 
day of her death, Jan. 28, 1727-8 : 

" She was sickly from her childhood, until about the age of fifteen ; but then she 
grew into perfect health, and was looked upon as one of the most beautiful, grace- 
ful, and agreeable young women in London — only a little too fat. Her hair was 
blacker than a raven, and every feature of her face in perfection. 

. . . . " Properly speaking" — he goes on with a calmness which, under the cir- 
cumstances, is terrible — "she has been dying six months !" 

" Never was any of her sex bom with better gifts of the mind, or who more im- 
proved them by reading and conversation All of us who had the happiness 

of her friendship agreed unanimously lluit in an afternoon's or evening's conversa- 
tion she never failed before we parted of delivering the best thing that was said in 
the company. Some of us have written down several of her sayings, or what the 
French call bans mots, wherein she excelled beyond belief." 

The specimens on record, however, in the Dean's paper called " Bons Mots de 
Stella," scarcely bear out this last part of the panegyric. But the following prove 
her wit : 

"A gentleman, who had been very silly and pert in her company, at last began to 
grieve at remembering the loss of a child lately dead. A bishop sitting by comfort 
ed him — that he should be easy, because ' the child was gone to heaven.' ' No, my 
lord,' said she ; ' that is it which most grieves him, because he is sure never to see 
his child there.' 

"When she was extremely ill, her physician said, 'Madam, you are near the 
bottom of the hill, but we will endeavour to get you up again.' She answered, 
* Doctor, I fear I shall be out of breath before I get up to the top.' 

" A very dirty clergyman of her acquaintance, who affected smartness and rep- 
artees, was asked by some of the company how his nails came to be so dirty. He 
was at a loss ; but she solved the difficulty, by saying, ' the Doctor's nails grew 
dirty by scratching himself 

"A quaker apothecary sent her a vial, corked; it had a broad brim, and a label 
of paper about its neck. ' What is that' — said she — ' my apothecary's son !' The 
ridiculous resemblance, and the suddenness of the question, set us all a-laughing." 
-Swift's Works, Scott's Ed. vol. ix. 295-6. 



44 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

the world : and so we cannot tell what her style was, or of 
what sort were the little letters which the Doctor placed 
there at night, and bade to appear from under his pillow of 
a morning. But in Letter IV. of that famous collection he 
describes his lodging in Bury-street, where he has the first 
floor, a dining-room and bed-chamber, at eight shillings a- 
week ; and in Letter VL he says " he has visited a lady 
just come to town," whose name somehow is not mention- 
ed ; and in Letter VIIL he enters a query of Stella's — 
" What do you mean ' that boards near me, that I dine 
with now and then V What the deuce I You know whom 
I have dined with every day since I left you, better than I 
do." Of course she does. Of course Swift has not the 
slightest idea of what she means. But in a few letters 
more it turns out that the Doctor has been to dine " grave- 
ly" with a Mrs. Vanhomrigh : then that he has been to " his 
neighbour :" then that he has been unwell, and means to 
dine for the whole week with his neighbour ! Stella was 
quite right in her previsions. She saw from the very first 
hint what was going to happen ; and scented Vanessa in 
the air.' The rival is at the Dean's feet. The pupil and 
teacher are reading together, and drinking tea together, and 
going to prayers together, and learning Latin together, and 
conjugating amo, amas, aniavi together. The little lan- 
guage is over for poor Stella. By the rule of grammar and 



\ 

' " I am so hot and lazy after my morning's walk, that I loitered at Mrs. Van- 
homrigh's, where my best gown and periwig was, and out of mere listlessness dine 
there, very often ; so I did to-day." — Journal to Stella. 

Mrs. Vanhomrigh, " Vanessa's" mother, was the widow of a Dutch merchant who 
held lucrative appointments in King William's time. The family settled in London 
in 1709, and had a house in Bury-street, St. James's — a street made notable by sucli 
residents as Swift and Steele ; and, in our own time, Moore and Crabbc. 



SWIFT. 45 

the course of conjugation, does not amavi come after amo 
and amas? 

The loves of Cadenus and Vanessa' you may peruse in 
Cadenus's own poem on the subject, and in poor Vanessa's 
vehement expostulatory verses and letters to him, she 
adoreshim, implores him, admires him, thinks him some- 
thing god-like, and only prays to be admitted to lie at his 
feet.'' As they are bringing him home from church, those 
divine feet of Dr. Swift's are found pretty often in Vanessa's 
parlour. He likes to be admired and adored. II y prend 
gout. He finds Miss Vanhomrigh to be a woman of great 
taste and spirit, and beauty and wit, and a fortune too. 
He sees her every day ; he does not tell Stella about the 



1 " Vanessa was excessively vain. The character given of her by Cadenus is 
fine painting, but in general fictitious. She was fond of dress ; impatient to be ad- 
mired ; very romantic in her turn of mind ; superior, in her own opinion, to all her 
sex ; full of pertness, gaiety, and pride ; not without some agreeable accomplish- 
ments, but far from being either beautiful or genteel ; happy in the thoughts 

of being reported Swift's concubine, but still aiming and intending to be his wife." 
— Lord Orrery. 

* " You bid me be easy, and you would see me as often as you could. You had 
better have said, as often as you can get the better of your inclinations so much ; 
or as often as you remember there was such a one in the world. If you continue 
to treat me as you do, you will not be made uneasy by me long. It is impossible 
to describe what I have suffered since I saw you last : I am sure I could have borne 
the rack much better than those killing, killing words of yours. Sometimes I have 
resolved to die without seeing you more ; but those resolves, to your misfortune, 
did not last long ; for there is something in human nature that prompts one so to 
find relief in this world I must give way to it, and beg you would see me, and speak 
kindly to me ; for I am sure you'd not condemn any one to suffer what I have done, 
could you but know it. The reason I write to you is, because I cannot tell it to 
you, should I see you ; for when I begin to complain, then you are angry, and there 
is something in your looks so awful that it strikes me dumb. Oh that you may 
have but so much regard for me left that this complaint may touch your soul with 
pity. I say as little as ever I can ; did you but know what I thought, I am sure it 
would move you to forgive me ; and believe I cannot help telling you this and live." 
—Vanessa. (M. 1714.) 



46 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

business : until the impetuous Vanessa becomes too fond 
of him, until the doctor is quite frightened by the young 
woman's ardour, and confounded by her warmth. He want- 
ed to marry neither of them — that I believe was the truth ; 
but if he had not married Stella, Vanessa would have had 
him in spite of himself. When he went back to Ireland, 
his Ariadne, not content to remain in her isle, pursued the 
fugitive Dean. In vain he protested, he vowed, he soothed 
and bullied ; the news of the Dean's marriage with Stella 
at last came to her, and it killed her — she died of that pas- 
sion.' 



' " If we consider Swift's behaviour, so far only as it relates to women, we shall 
find that he looked upon them rather as busts than as whole figures." — Orrery. 

" You must have smiled to have found his house a constant seraglio of very vir- 
tuous women, who attended him from morning to night." — Orrery. 

A correspondent of Sir Walter Scott's furnished him with the materials on which 
to found the following interesting passage about Vanessa — after she had retired to 
cherish her passion in retreat : — 

" Marley Abbey, near Celbridge, where Miss Vanhomrigh resided, is built much 
in the form of a real cloister, especially in its external appearance. An aged man 
(upwards of ninety, by his own account) showed the grounds to my correspondent 
He was the son of Mrs. Vanhomrigh's gardener, and used to work with his father 
in the garden while a boy. He remembered the unfortunate Vanessa well ; and 
his account of her corresponded with the usual description of her person, especially 
as to her embonpomt. He said she went seldom abroad, and saw little company : 
her constant amusement was reading, or walking in the garden She avoid- 
ed company, and was always melancholy, save when Dean Swift was there, and 
then she seemed happy. The garden was to an uncommon degree crowded with 
laurels. The old man said that when Miss Vanhomrigh expected the Dean she 
always planted with her own hand a laurel or two against his arrival. He showed 
her favourite seat, still called ' Vanessa's bower.' Three or four trees and some 

laurels indicate the spot There were two seats and a rude table within 

the bower, the opening of which commanded a view of the LifTey In this 

sequestered spot, according to the old gardener's account, the Dean and Vanessa 
used often to sit, with books and writing materials on the table before them." — 
Scott's Swift, vol. i. pp. 246-7. 

. . . . " But Miss Vanhomrigh, irritated at the situation in which she found her- 
self, determined on bringing to a crisis those expectations of a union with the object 



i 



SWIFT. 47 

And when she died, and Stella heard that Swift had 
written beautifully regarding her, " that does not surprise 
me," said Mrs. Stella, " for we all know the Dean could 
write beautifully about a broomstick." A woman — a true 
woman ! "Would you have had one of them forgive the 
other ? 

In a note in his biography, Scott says that his friend 
Dr. Tuke, of Dublin, has a lock of Stella's hair, enclosed 
in a paper by Swift, on which are written in the Dean's 
hand, the words: " Only a looman's hairP An instance, 



of her affections — to the hope of which she had clung amid every vicissitude of his 
conduct towards her. The most probable bar was his undefined connection with 
Mrs. Johnson, which, as it must have been perfectly known to her, had, doubtless, 
long elicited her secret jealousy, although only a single hint to that purpose is to 
be found in their correspondence, and that so early as 1713, when she writes to him 
— then in Ireland — ' If you are very happy, it is ill-natured of you not to tell me so, 
except ^tis what is inconsistent with mine.^ Her silence and patience under this state 
of uncertainty for no less than eight years, must have been partly owing to her awe 
for Swift, and partly, perhaps, to the weak state of her rival's health, which, from 
year to year, seemed to announce speedy dissolution. At length, however, Vanes- 
sa's impatience prevailed, and she ventured on the decisive step of writing to Mrs. 
Johnson herself, requesting to know the nature of that connection. Stella, in reply, 
informed her of her marriage with the Dean ; and full of the highest resentment 
against Swift for having given another female such a right in him as Miss Vanhom- 
righ's inquiries implied, she sent to him her rival's letter of interrogatories, and, 
without seeing him, or awaiting his reply, retired to the house of Mr. Ford, near 
Dublin. Every reader knows the consequence. Swift, in one of those paroxysms 
of fury to which he was liable, both from temper and disease, rode instantly to Mar- 
ley Abbey. As he entered the apartment, the sternness of his countenance, which 
was peculiarly formed to express the fiercer passions, struck the unfortunate Va- 
nessa with such terror that she could scarce ask whether he would not sit down. 
He answered by flinging a letter on the table, and, instantly leaving the house, re- 
mounted his horse, and returned to Dublin. When Vanessa opened the packet, she 
only found her own letter to Stella. It was her death warrant. She sunk at once 
under the disappointment of the delayed, yet cherished hopes which had so long 
sickened her heart, and beneath the unrestrained wrath of him for whose sake she 
had indulged them. How long she survived the last interview is uncertain, but the 
time does not seem to have exceeded a few weeks." — Scott. 



48 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

says Scott, of the Dean's desire to veil his feelings under 
the mask of cynical indifference. 

See the various notions of critics ! Do those words 
indicate indifference or an attempt to hide feeling ? Did 
you ever hear or read four words more pathetic ? Only a 
woman's hair, only love, only fidelity, only purity, innocence, 
beauty ; only the tenderest heart in the world stricken and 
wounded, and passed away now out of reach of pangs of 
hope deferred, love insulted, and pitiless desertion ; — only 
that lock of hair left : and memory and remorse, for the 
guilty, lonely wretch, shuddering over the grave of his 
victim. 

And yet to have had so much love, he must have given 
some. Treasures of wit and wisdom and tenderness, too, 
must that man have had locked up in the caverns of his 
gloomy heart, and shown fitfully to one or two whom he 
took in there. But it was not good to visit that place. 
People did not remain there long, and suffered for having 
been there.' He shrank away from all affections sooner or 
later. Stella and Vanessa both died near him, and away 
from him. He had not heart enough to see them die. 
He broke from his fastest friend, Sheridan ; he slunk 
away from his fondest admirer. Pope. His laugh jars on 
one's ear after seven score years. He was always alone 
— alone and gnashing in the darkness, except when Stella's 
sweet smile came and shone upon him. When that went. 



' " M. Swift est Rabelais dans son bon sens, et vivant en bonne coinpagnie. II 
n'a pass, k la verite, la gaite du premier, mais il a toute la finesse, la raison, le 
choix, le bon gout qui manquent il notre cure de Meudon. Ses vers sont d'un 
gout singulier, et presque inimitable ; la bonne plaisanlerie est son partage en vers 
et en prose ; mais pour le bien en tendre il faut faire un petit voyage dans son 
pays." — Voltaire, Lettre.s sur les Anglais, Let. 22. 



SWIFT. 49 

silence and utter night closed over him. An immense 
genius: an awful downfall and ruin. So great a man he 
seems to me, that thinking of him is like thinking of an 
empire falling. We have other great names to mention — 
none I think, however, so great or so gloomy. 

C 



LECTURE THE SECOND. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 

A GREAT number of years ago, before the passing of the 
Reform Bill, there existed at Cambridge a certain debating 
club, called the " Union," and I remember that there was 
a tradition amongst the undergraduates who frequented 
that renowned school of oratory, that the great leaders of 
the Opposition and G-overnment had their eyes upon the 
University Debating Club, and that if a man distinguished 
himself there he ran some chance of being returned to 
Parliament as a great nobleman's nominee. So Jones of 
John's, or Thomson of Trinity, would rise in their might, 
and draping themselves in their gowns, rally round the 
monarchy, or hurl defiance at priests and kings with the 
majesty of Pitt or the fire of Mirabeau, fancying all the 
while that the great nobleman's emissary was listening 
to the debate from the back benches, where he was sitting 
with the family seat in his pocket. Indeed, the legend 
said that one or two young Cambridge-men, orators of 
the Union, were actually caught up thence, and carried 
down to Cornwall or old Sarum, and so into Parliament. 
And many a young fellow deserted the jogtrot University 
curriculum, to hang on in the dust behind the fervid 
wheels of the parliamentary chariot. 

Where, I have often wondered, were the sons of peers 
and members of Parliament in Anne's and Greorge's time ? 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 51 

Were they all in the army, or hunting in the country, or 
boxing the watch ? How was it that the young gentle- 
men from the University got such a prodigious number of 
places ? A lad composed a neat copy of verses at Christ- 
church or Trinity, in which the death of a great personage 
was bemoaned, the French king assailed, the Dutch or 
Prince Eugene complimented, or the reverse ; and the 
party in power was presently to provide for the young 
poet ; and a commissionership, or a post in the Stamps, or 
the secretaryship of an embassy, or a clerkship in the 
Treasury, came into the bard's possession. A wonderful 
fruit-bearing rod was that of Busby's. What have men 
of letters got in owr time ? Think, not only of Swift, a 
king fit to rule in any time an empire — but Addison, 
Steele, Prior, Tickell, Congreve, John Gay, John Dennis, 
and many others who got public employment, and pretty 
little pickings out of the public pur^e.' The wits of whoso 

' The following is a conspectus of them : — 

Addison. — Commissioner of Appeals ; Under Secretary of State ; Secretary to 
the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland ; Keeper of the Records in Ireland ; 
Lord of Trade ; and one of the Principal Secretaries of State, suc- 
cessively. 

Steele. — Commissioner of the Stamp Office ; Surveyor of the Royal Stables at 
Hampton Court ; and Governor of the Royal Company of Comedians ; 
Commissioner of " Forfeited Estates in Scotland." 

Prior. — Secretary to the Embassy at the Hague ; Gentleman of the Bedchamber 
to King William ; Secretary to the Embassy in France ; Under Sec- 
retary of State ; Ambassador to France. 

Tickell. — Under Secretary of State ; Secretary to the Lord Justices of Ireland. 

Congreve. — Commissioner for licensing Hackney Coaches ; Commissioner for 
Wine Licenses ; Place in the Pipe Office ; post in the Custom 
House ; Secretary of Jamaica. 

Gay. — Secretary to the Earl of Clarendon (when Ambassador to Hanover). 

John Dennis. — A place in the Custom House. 

" En Angleterre les lettres sent plus en honneur qu'ici." — Voltaire, 

Lettres sur les Anglais, Let. 20. 



52 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

names we shall treat in this lecture and two following, all 
(save one) touched the King's coin, and had, at some pe- 
riod of their lives, a happy quarter-day coming round for 
them. 

They all began at school or college in the regular way, 
producing panegyrics upon public characters, what were 
called odes upon public events, battles, sieges, court mar- 
riages and deaths, in which the gods of Olympus and the 
tragic muse were fatigued with invocations, according to 
the fashion of the time in France and in England. Aid 
us Mars, Bacchus, Apollo, cried Addison, or Congreve, 
singing of William or Marlborough. '■'■ Accourez, chastes 
nymphes de Permesse,'''' says Boileau, celebrating the 
Grand Monarch. " Des sons que ma lyre enfante, mar- 
quez en bien la cadence, et vous, vents, faites silence I je 
vats parler de Louis .'" School-boys' themes and founda- 
tion-exercises are the only relics left now of this scholas- 
tic fashion. The Olympians remain quite undisturbed in 
their mountain. What man of note, what contributor to 
the poetry of a country newspaper, would now think of 
writing a congratulatory ode on the birth of the heir to a 
dukedom, or the marriage of a nobleman ? In the past 
century the young gentlemen of the Universities all exer- 
cised themselves at these queer compositions ; and some 
got fame, and some gained patrons and places for life, and 
many more took nothing by these efforts of what they 
were pleased to call their muses. 

William Congreve's' Pindaric Odes are still to be found 
in "Johnson's Poets," that now unfrequented poet's corner, 

' He was the eon of Colonel William Congreve, and grandson of Richard Con- 
greve, Esq., of Congreve and Stretton in Staffordshire — a very ancient family. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 63 

in which so many forgotten big-wigs have a niche — but 
though he was also voted to be one of the greatest tragic 
poets of any day, it was Congreve's wit and humour which 
first recommended him to courtly fortune. And it is re- 
corded, that his first play, the " Old Bachelor," brought 
our author to the notice of that great patron of the English 
musesj Charles Montague Lord Halifax, who being desirous 
to place so eminent a wit in a state of ease and tranquillity, 
instantly made him one of the commissioners for licensing 
hackney-coaches, bestowed on him soon after a place in 
the Pipe-office, and likewise a post in the Custom-house 
of the value of 600/. 

A commissionership of hackney-coaches — a post in the 
Custom-house — a place in the Pipe-office, and all for writ- 
ing a comedy ! Does not it sound like a fable, that place in 
the Pipe-office ?' Ah, Pheureux temps que celui de ces fa- 
bles ! Men of letters there still be : but I doubt whether 
any pipe-offices are left. The public has smoked them 
long ago. 

Words, like men, pass current for a while with the pub- 



' " Pipe. — Pipe, in law, is a roll in the Exchequer, called also the great roll. 

"FiP'E-Office is an office in which a person called the Clerk of the Pipe makes 
out leases of crown lands, by warrant, from the Lord-Treasurer, or Commissioners 
of the Treasury, or Chancellor of the Exchequer. 

" Clerk of the Pipe makes up all accounts of sheriffs, &c." — Rees. Cyclopad. 
Art. Pipe. 

" PiPE-Oj^ce. — Spelman thinks so called because the papers were kept in a large 
pipe or cask." 

" These be at last brought into that office of Her Majesty's Exchequer, which we, 

by a metaphor, do call the pipe because the whole receipt is finallj' con- 

vej'ed into it by means of divers small pipes or quills." — Bacon. The Office of 
Alienations. 

[We are indebted to Richardson's Dictionary for this fragment of erudition. But 
a modern man-of-letters can know little on these points, by — experience.] 



54 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

lie, and being known everywhere abroad, at length take 
their places in society ; so even the most secluded and re- 
fined ladies here present will have heard the phrase from 
their sons or brothers at school, and will permit me to call 
William Congreve, Esquire, the most eminent literary 
" swell" of his age. In my copy of " Johnson's Lives" 
Congreve's wig is the tallest, and put on with the jaunti- 
est air of all the laurelled worthies. " I am the great Mr. 
Congreve," he seems to say, looking out from his volumin- 
ous curls. People called him the great Mr. Congreve.' 
From the beginning of his career until the end everybody 
admired him. Having got his education in Ireland, at 
the same school and college with Swift ; he came to live 
in the Middle Temple, London, where he luckily bestowed 
no attention to the law ; but splendidly frequented the 
coftee-houses and theatres, and appeared in the side-box, 
the tavern, the Piazza and the Mall, brilliant, beautiful, 
and victorious from the first. Everybody acknowledged 
the young chieftain. The great Mr. Dryden* declared 



' " It has been observed that no change of ministers affected him in the least, 
nor was he ever removed from any post that was given to him, except to a better. 
His place in the Custom-House, and his office of Secretary in Jamaica, are said to 
have brought him in upwards of twelve hundred a year." — Biog. Brit., Art. CoN- 

GKEVK. 

' Drj-den addressed his " twelfth epistle" to " My dear friend Mr. Congreve," on 
his comedy called the " Double Dealer," in which he says — 

" Great Jonson did by strength of judgment please ; 
Yet, doubling Fletcher's force, he wants his ease. 
In differing talents both adom'd their age ; 
One for the study, t'other for the stage. 
But both to Congreve justly shall submit. 
One match'd in judgment, both o'ermatched in wit. 
In him all beauties of this age we see," &c., &c. 

The " Double Dealer," however, was not so palpable a hit as the " Old Bachelor," 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 55 

that he was equal to Shakspeare, and bequeathed to him 
his own undisputed poetical crown, and writes of him, 
" Mr. Congreve has done me the favour to review the 
' iEneis,' and compare my version with the original. I 
shall never be ashamed to own that this excellent young 
man has showed me many faults which I have endeavour- 
ed to correct," 

The " excellent young man" was but three or four-and- 
twenty when the great Dryden thus spoke of him : the 
greatest literary chief in England, the veteran field-marshal 
of letters, himself the marked man of all Europe, and the 
centre of a school of wits, who daily gathered round his 
chair and tobacco-pipe at Wills' . Pope dedicated his ' ' Iliad" 
to him ;^ Swift, Addison, Steele, all acknowledge Congreve's 



but, at first, met with opposition. The critics having fallen foul of it, our " swell" 
applied the scourge to that presumptuous body, in the " Epistle Dedicatoiy" to the 
" Right Honourable Charles Montague." 

" I was conscious," said he, " where a true critic might have put me upon my 

defence. I was prepared for the attack, but I have not heard anything 

said sufficient to provoke an answer." He goes on — 

" But there is one thing at which I am more concerned than all the false criti- 
cisms that are made upon me ; and that is, some of the ladies are offended. I am 
heartily sorry for it ; for I declare, I would rather disoblige all the critics in the 
world than one of the fair sex. They are concerned that I have represented some 
women vicious and affected. How can I help it ? It is the business of a comic 

poet to paint the vices and follies of human kind I should be very glad of 

an opportunity to make my compliments to those ladies who are offended. But 
they can no more expect it in a comedy, than to be tickled by a surgeon when he is 
letting their blood." 

'■ "Instead of endeavouring to raise a vain monument to myself, let me leave be- 
hind me a memorial of my friendship, with one of the most valuable men as well as 
finest writers of my age and country — one who has tried, and knows by his own ex- 
perience, how hard an undertaking it is to do justice to Homer — and one who, I am 
sure, seriously rejoices with me at the period of my labours. To him, therefore, 
having brought this long work to a conclusion, I desire to dedicate it, and to have 
the honour and satisfaction of placing together in this manner the names of Mr. Con- 



56 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

rank, and lavish connpliments upon him. Voltaire went to 
wait upon him as on one of the Representatives of Litera- 
ture — and the man who scarce praises any other living per- 
son, who flung ahuse at Pope, and Swift, and Steele, and 
Addison, — the Grub-street Timon, old John Dennis,' was 
hat in hand to Mr. Congreve ; and said, that when he re- 
tired from the stage, Comedy went with him. 

Nor was he less victorious elsewhere. He was admired 
in the drawing-rooms as well as the coffee-houses ; as much 
beloved in the side-box as on the stage. He loved, and con- 
quered, and jilted the beautiful Bracegirdle,' the heroine 
of all his plays, the favourite of all the town of her day — 
and the Duchess of Marlborough, Marlborough's daughter, 
had such an admiration of him, that when he died she had 
an ivory figure made to imitate him,^ and a large wax doll 
with gouty feet to be dressed just as the great Congreve's 
gouty feet were dressed in his great lifetime. He saved 
some money by his Pipe-office, and his Custom-house office, 
and his Hackney-coach office, and nobly left it, not to Brace- 

greve and of — A.Pope." Postscript to Translation of the Iliad of Homer. March 
25, 1720. 

1 " When asked why he listened to the praises of Dennis, he said, he had much 
rather be flattered than abused. Swift had a particular friendship for our author, 
and generally took hirn under his protection in his high authoritative manner." — 
Thos. Davies. Dramatic Miscellanies. 

' " Congreve was very intimate for years with Mrs. Bracegirdle, and lived in the 
same street, his house very near hers, until his acquaintance with the young Duchess 
of Marlborough. He then quitted that house. The Duchess showed us a diamond 
necklace (wnich Lady Di. used afterwards to wear) that cost seven thousand pounds, 
and was purchased with the money Congreve left her. How much better would it 
have been to have given it to poor Mrs. Bracegirdle." — Dr. Young, Spencers Anec- 
dotes. 

^ " A glass was put in the hand of the statue, which was supposed to bow to her 
Grace and to nod in approbation of what she spoke to it." — Thos. Davies. Dra 
matic Miscellanies. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 5'< 

girdle, who wanted it/ but to the Duchess of Marlborough, 
who did not." 

How can I introduce to you that merry and shameless 
Comic Muse who won him such a reputation ? Nell 
Gwynn's servant fought the other footmen for having called 
his mistress bad names ; and in like manner, and with 
pretty like epithets, Jeremy Collier attacked that godless, 
reckless Jezebel, the English comedy of his time, and called 
her what Nell Grwynn's man's fellow-servants called Nell 
Grwynn's man's mistress — ^the servants of the theatre, Dry- 
den, Congreve,' and others, defended themselves with the 

' The s\im Congreve left her was 200/., as is said in the " Dramatic Miscellanies" 
of Tom Davies ; where are some particulars about this charming actress and beau- 
tiful woman. 

She had a " lively aspect," says Tom, on the authority of Gibber, and " such a 
glow of health and cheerfulness in her countenance, as inspired everybody with de- 
sire." " Scarce an audience saw her that were not half of them her lovers." 

Congreve and Rowe courted her in the persons of their lovers. " In Tamerlane, 

Rowe courted her Selima, in the person of Axalla ; Congreve insinuated 

his addresses in his Valentine to her Angelica, in his 'Love for Love ;' in his Os- 
myn to her Almena, in the ' Mourning- Bride ;' and, lastly, in his Mirabel to her Mil- 
lamant, in the ' Way of the World.' Mirabel, the fine gentleman of the play, is, I 
believe, not very distant from the real character of Congreve." — Dramatic Miscella- 
nies, vol. iii. 1784. 

She retired from the stage when Mrs. Oldfield began to be the public favourite. 
She died in 1748, in the eighty-fifth year of her age. 

' Johnson calls his legacy the " accumulation of attentive parsimony, which," he 
continues, " though to her (the Duchess) superfluous and useless, might have given 
great assistance to the ancient family from which he descended, at tnat time, by the 
imprudence of his relation, reduced to difficulties and distress." — Lives of the Poets. 

^ He replied to Collier, in the pamphlet called " Amendments of Mr. Colliers 
False and Imperfect Citations," &c. A specimen or two are subjoined : — 

" The greater part of these examples which he has produced, are only demonstra- 
tions of his own impurity : they only savour of his utterance, and were sweet 
enough till tainted by his breath. 

" Where the expression is unblameable in its own pure and genuine signification, 
he enters into it, himself, like the evil spirit ; he possesses the innocent phrase, and 
makes it bellow forth his own blasphemies. 

C 2 



68 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

same success, and for the same cause which set Nell's lackey 
fighting. She was a disreputable, daring, laughing, paint- 
ed French baggage, that Comic Muse. She came over from 
the continent with Charles (who chose many more of his 
female friends there) at the Restoration — a wild, dishevelled 
Lais, with eyes bright with wit and wine — a saucy court- 
favourite that sate at the King's knees, and laughed in his 
face, and when she showed her bold cheeks at her chariot- 
window, had some of the noblest and most famous people 
of the land bowing round her wheel. She was kind and 
popular enough, that daring Comedy, that audacious poor 
Nell — she was gay and generous, kind, frank, as such peo- 
ple can afford to be : and the men who lived with her and 
laughed with her, took her pay and drank her wine, turned 
out when the Puritans hooted her, to fight and defend her. 
But the jade was indefensible, and it is pretty certain her 
servants knew it. 

There is life and death going on in every thing : truth 
and lies are always at battle. Pleasure is always warring 
against self-restraint. Doubt is always crying Psha, and 
sneering. A man in life, a humourist in writing about life, 
sways over to one principle or the other, and laughs with 
the reverence for right and the love of truth in his heart, or 
laughs at these from the other side. Didn't I tell you that 

" If I do not return him civilities in calling him names, it is because I am not very- 
well versed in his nomenclatures I will only call him Mr. Collier, and 

that I will call him as often as I think he shall deserve it. 

"The corruption of a rotten divine is the generation of a sour critic." 
" Congreve," says Dr. Johnson, " a very young man, elated with success, and im- 
patient of censure, assumed an air of confidence and security The dispute 

was protracted through two years ; hut at last Comedy grew more modest, and Col- 
lier lived to see the reward of his labours in the reformation of the theatre." — Lift 
if Congrrv*. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 59 

dancing was a serious business to Harlequin ? I have read 
two or three of Congreve's plays over before speaking of 
him ; and my feelings were rather like those, which I dare- 
say most of us here have had, at Pompeii, looking at Sal- 
lust's house and the relics of an orgy, a dried wine-jar or 
two, a charred supper-table, the breast of a dancing girl 
pressed against the ashes, the laughing skull of a jester, a 
perfect stillness round about, as the Cicerone twangs his 
moral, and the blue sky shines calmly over the ruin. The 
Congreve muse is dead, and her song choked in Time's ashes. 
We gaze at the skeleton, and wonder at the life which once 
revelled in its mad veins. We take the skull up, and muse 
over the frolic and daring, the wit, scorn, passion, hope, de- 
sire, with which that empty bowl once fermented. We 
think of the glances that allured, the tears that melted, of 
the bright eyes that shone in those vacant sockets ; and of 
lips whispering love, and cheeks dimpling with smiles, that 
once covered yon ghastly yellow frame-work. They used 
to call those teeth pearls once. See I there's the cup she 
drank from, the gold-chain she wore on her neck, the vase 
which held the rouge for her cheeks, her looking-glass, and 
the harp she used to dance to. Instead of a feast we find 
a grave-stone, and in place of a mistress, a few bones ! 

Reading in these plays now, is like shutting your ears 
and looking at people dancing. What does it mean ? the 
measures, the grimaces, the bowing, shuffling and retreat- 
ing, the cavalier soul advancing upon those ladies — those 
ladies and men twirling round at the end in a mad galop, 
after which everybody bows and the quaint rite is cele- . 
brated. Without the music we cannot understand that com- 
ic dance of the last century — its strange gravity and gaiety, 



so ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

its decorum or its indecorum. It has a jargon of its own 
quite unlike life ; a sort of moral of its own quite unlike 
life too. I'm afraid it's a Heathen mystery, symbolising a 
Pagan doctrine ; protesting, as the Pompeians very likely 
were, assembled at their theatre and laughing at their 
games — as Sallust and his friends, and their mistresses pro- 
tested — crowned with flowers, with cups in their hands, 
against the new, hard, ascetic pleasure-hating doctrine, 
whose gaunt disciples, lately passed over from the Asian 
shores of the Mediterranean were for breaking the fair im- 
ages of Venus, and flinging the altars of Bacchus down. 

I fancy poor Congreve's theatre is a temple of Pagan de- 
lights, and mysteries not permitted except among heathens. 
I fear the theatre carries down that ancient tradition and 
worship, as masons have carried their secret signs and rites 
from temple to temple. "When the libertine hero carries off 
the beauty in the play, and the dotard is laughed to scorn 
for having the young wife : in the ballad, when the poet bid 
his mistress to gather roses while she may, and warns her 
that old Time is still a-flying : in the ballet, when honest 
Corydon courts Phillis under the treillage of the pasteboard 
cottage, and leers at her over the head of grandpapa in red 
stockings, who is opportunely asleep ; and when seduced 
by the invitations of the rosy youth she comes forward to 
the footlights, and they perform on each other's tiptoes that 
pas which you all know and which is only interrupted by 
old grandpapa awaking from his doze at the pasteboard cha- 
let (whither he returns to take another nap in case the young 
people get an encore) : when Harlequin, splendid in youth, 
strength and agility, arrayed in gold and a thousand colours, 
springs over the heads of countless perils, leaps down the 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 61 

throat of bewildered giants, and, dauntless and splendid, 
dances danger down : when Mr. Punch, that godless old 
rebel, breaks every law and laughs at it with odious tri- 
umph, outwits his lawyer, bullies the beadle, knocks his 
wife about the head, and hangs the hangman, — don't you 
see in the comedy, in the song, in the dance, in the ragged 
little Punch's puppet-show, — the Pagan protest ? Does not 
it seem as if Life puts in its plea and sings its comment ? 
Look how the lovers walk and hold each other's hands and 
whisper ! Sings the chorus — " There is nothing like love, 
there is nothing like youth, there is nothing like beauty of 
your spring time. Look I how old age tries to meddle with 
merry sport ! Beat him with his own crutch, the wrink- 
led old dotard ! There is nothing like youth, there is noth- 
ing like beauty, there is nothing like strength. Strength 
and valour win beauty and youth. Be brave and conquer. 
Be young and happy. Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy ! Would you 
know the Segretto per esser felice ? Here it is, in a smil- 
ing mistress and a cup of Falernian." As the boy tosses 
the cup and sings his song. Hark I what is that chaunt 
coming nearer and nearer ? What is that dirge which will 
disturb us ? The lights of the festival burn dim — the 
cheeks turn pale — the voice quavers — and the cup drops 
on the floor. Who is there ? Death and fate are at the 
gate, and they will come in. 

Congreve's comic feast flares with lights, and round the 
table, emptying their flaming bowls of drink, and ex- 
changing the wildest jests and ribaldry, sit men and wom- 
en, waited on by rascally valets and attendants as disso- 
lute as their mistresses — perhaps the very worst company 
in the world. There does not seem to be a pretence of 



62 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

morals. At the head of the table sits Mirabel or Belmour 
(dressed in the French fashion and waited on by English 
imitators of Scapin and Frontin). Their calling is to be 
irresistible, and to conquer everywhere. Like the heroes 
of the chivalry story, whose long-winded loves and combats 
they were sending out of fashion ; they are always splen- 
did and triumphant — overcome all dangers, vanquish all 
enemies, and win the beauty at the end. Fathers, hus- 
bands, usurers, are the foes these champions contend with. 
They are merciless in old age, invariably, and an old man 
plays the part in the dramas which the wicked enchanter 
or the great blundering giant performs in the chivalry tales, 
who threatens and grumbles and resists — a huge stupid ob- 
stacle always overcome by the knight. It is an old man 
with a money-box : Sir Belmour his son or nephew spends 
his money and laughs at him. It is an old man with a 
young wife whom he locks up ; Sir Mirabel robs him of his 
wife, trips up his gouty old heels and leaves the old hunx 
— the old fool, what business has he to hoard his money or 
to lock up blushing eighteen ? Money is for youth, love is 
for youth, away with the old people. When Millamant is 
sixty, having of course divorced the first Lady Millamant, 
and married his friend Doricourt's grand-daughter out of the 
nursery — it will be his turn ; and young Belmour will make 
a fool of him. All this pretty morality you have in the 
comedies of William Congreve, Esq. They are full of wit. 
Such manners as he observes, he observes with great hu- 
mour ; but ah ! it is a weary feast that banquet of wit 
where no love is. It palls very soon ; sad indigestions fol- 
low it and lonely blank headaches in the morning. 

I cannot pretend to quote scenes from the splendid Con- 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 63 

greve's plays' — which are undeniably bright, witty, and 
daring, — any more than I could ask you to hear the dia- 



* The scene of Valentine's pretended madness in " Love for Love," is a splendid 
specimen of Congreve's daring manner : — 

Scatidal. — And have you given your master a hint of their plot upon him ? 

Jeremy. — Yes, Sir ; he says he'll favour it, and mistake her for Angelica. 

Scandal. — It may make us sport. 

Foresight. — Mercy on us ! 

Valentine. — Husht — interrupt me not — I'll whisper predictions to thee, and thou 
shalt prophesie ; — I am truth, and can teach thy tongue a new trick, — I have told 
thee what's passed, — now I'll tell what's to come : — Dost thou know what will 
happen to-morrow ? Answer me not — for I will tell thee. To-morrow knaves will 
thrive thro' craft, and fools thro' fortune ; and honesty will go as it did, frost-nipt 
in a summer suit. Ask me questions concerning to-morrow. 

Scandal. — Ask him, Mr. Foresight. 

Foresight. — Pray what will be done at Court ? 

Va'entine. — Scandal will tell you ; — I am truth, I never come there. 

Foresight. — In the city ? 

Valentine. — Oh, prayers will be said in empty churches at the usual hours. Yet 
you will see such zealous faces behind counters, as if religion were to be sold in 
every shop. Oh, things will go methodically in the city, the clocks will strike 
twelve at noon, and the horn'd herd buz in the Exchange at two. Husbands and 
wives will drive distinct trades, and care and pleasure separately occupy the family. 
Coffee-houses will be full of smoke and stratagem. And the cropt prentice that 
sweeps his master's shop in the morning, may, ten to one, dirty his sheets before 
night. But there are two things, that you will see very strange ; which are, wan- 
ton wives with their legs at liberty, and tame cuckolds with chains about their 
necks. But hold, I must examine you before I go further ; you look suspiciously. 
Are you a husband ? 

Foresight. — I am married. 

Valentine. — Poor creature ! Is your wife of Covent-garden Parish ? 

Foresight. — No ; St. Martin 's-in-the-Fields. 

Valentine. — Alas, poor man ! his eyes are sunk, and his hands shrivelled ; his 
leggs dwindled, and his back bow'd. Pray, pray, for a metamorphosis — change 
thy shape, and shake off age ; get the Medea's kettle and be boiled anew ; come 
forth with lab'iing callous hands, and chine of steel, and Atlas' shoulders. Let 
Taliacotius trim the calves of twenty chairmen, and make the pedastals to stand 
erect upon, and look matrimony in the face. Ha, ha, ha ! That a man should 
have a stomach to a wedding supper, when the pidgeons ought rather to be laid to 
his feet ! ha, ha, ha ! 

Foresight. — His frenzy is very high now, Mr. Scandal. 



64 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

logue of a witty bargeman and a brilliant fish-woman ex- 
changing compliments at Billingsgate ; but some of his 

Scandal. — I believe it is a spring-tide. 

Foresight. — Very likely — truly ; you understand these matters. Mr. Scandal, I 
shall be very glad to confer with you about these things he has uttered. His say- 
ings are very mysterious and hieroglyphical. 

Valentine. — Oh ! why would Angelica be absent from my eyes so long ? 

Jeremy. — She's here, Sir. 

Mrs. Foresight. — Now, Sister! 

Mrs. Frail. — O Lord ! what must I say ? 

Scandal. — Humour him. Madam, by all means. 

Valentine. — Where is she ? Oh ! I see her ; she comes, like Riches, Health, 
and Liberty at once, to a despairing, starving, and abandoned wretch. Oh — wel- 
come, welcome ! 

Mrs. Frail. — How d'ye. Sir ? Can I serve you ? 

Valentine. — Hark'ee — I have a secret to tell you, Endymion and the moon shall 
meet as on Mount Latmos, and we'll be married in the dead of night. But say not 
a word. Hymen shall put his torch into a dark lanthom, that it may be secret ; 
and Juno shall give her peacock poppy-water, that he may fold his ogling tail ; and 
Argus's hundred eyes be shut — ha ! Nobody shall know, but Jeremy. 

Mrs. Frail. — No, no ; we'll keep it secret ; it shall be done presently. 

Valentine. — The sooner the better. Jeremy, come hither — closer — that none may 
overhear us. Jeremy, I can tell you news ; Angelica is turned nun, and I am turn- 
ing friar, and yet we'll marry one another in spite of the Pope. Get me a cowl and 
beads, that I may play my part ; for she'll meet me two hours hence in black and 
white, and a long veil to cover the project, and we won't see one another's faces 
till we have done something to be ashamed of, and then we'll blush once for all. . . 
Enter Tattle. 

Tattle. — Do you know me, Valentine ? 

Valentine. — You ! — who are you ? No ; I hope not. 

Tattle. — I am Jack Tattle, your friend. 

Valentine. — My friend ! What to do ? I am no mnrried man, and thou canst not 
lye with my wife ; I am very poor, and thou canst not borrow money of me. Then, 
what employment have I for a friend ? 

Tattle. — Hah ! A good open speaker, and not to be trusted with a secret. 

Angelica. — Do you know me, Valentitie ? 

Valentine. — Oh, very well. 

Angelica. — Who am I ? 

Valentine. — You're a woman ; one to whom Heaven gave beauty when it grafted 
roses on a brier. You are the reflection of Heaven in a pond ; and he that leaps at 
you is sunk. You are all white — a sheet of spotless paper — when you first are 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 65 

verses, — they were amongst the most famous lyrics of the 
time, and pronounced equal to Horace hy his contempora- 

born ; but you are to be scrawled and blotted by every goose's quill. I know you ; 
for I loved a woman, and loved her so long that I found out a strange thing ; I 
found out what a woman was good for. 

Tattle. — Ay ! pr'ythee, what's that? 

Valentine. — Why, to keep a secret. 

Tattle.— O Lord ! 

Valentine. — O, exceeding good to keep a secret ; for, though she should tell, yet 
she is not to be believed. 

Tattle. — Hah ! Good again, faith. 

Valentine. — I would have musick. Sing me the song that I like. 
— CoNGKEVE. " LovefoT Love." 

There is a Mrs. Nicklehy, of the year 1700, in Congreve's Comedy of " The 
Double Dealer," in whose character the author introduces some wonderful traits 
of roguish satire. She is practised on by the gallants of the play, and no more 
knows how to resist them than any of the ladies above quoted could resist Con- 
greve. 

Lady Plyant. — O ! reflect upon the honour of your conduct ! Offering to pervert 
me [the joke is that the gentleman is pressing the lady for her daughter's hand, not 
for her own] — perverting me from the road of virtue, in which I have trod thus 
long, and never made one trip — not one faux pas ; O, consider it ; what would you 
have to answer for, if you should provoke me to frailty ! Alas ! humanity is feeble, 
Heaven knows ! Very feeble, and unable to support itself 

Mellefont. — Where am I ? Is it day ? and am I awake ? Madam — 

Lady Plyant. — O Lord, ask me the question ! I'll swear I'll deny it — therefore 
don't ask me ; nay, you sha'n t ask me ; I swear I'll deny it. O Gemini, you have 
brought all the blood into my face ; I warrant 1 am as red as a turkey-cock ; O fie, 
cousin Mellefont ! 

Mellefont. — Nay, madam, hear me ; I mean — 

Lady Plyant. — Hear you ? No, no ; I'll deny you first, and hear you afterwards. 
For one does not know how one's mind may change upon hearing — hearing is one 
of the senses, and all the senses are fallible. I won't trust my honour, I assure 
you ; my honour is infallible and uncomatable. 

Mellefont. — For Heaven's sake, madam — 

Lady Plyant. — O, name it no more. Bless me, how can you talk of heaven, and 
have so much wickedness in your heart ? May be, you dosn't think a sin. They 
say some of you gentlemen don't think it a sin ; but still, my honour, if it were no 
sin . But, then, to marry my daughter for the convenience of frequent oppor- 
tunities, — I'll never consent to that : as sure as can be, I'll break the match. 

Mellefont. — Death and amazement ! Madam, upon my knees — 



66 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ries, — may give an idea of his power, of his grace, of his 
daring manner, his magnificence in compliment, and his 
pohshed sarcasm. He writes as if he was so accustomed 
to conquer, that he has a poor opinion of his victims. 
Nothing is new except their faces, says he ; " every woman 
is the same." He says this in his first comedy, which he 
wrote languidly' in illness, when he was an " excellent 
young man." Richelieu at eighty could have hardly said 
a more excellent thing. 

When he advances to make one of his conquests it is 
with a splendid gallantry, in full uniform and with the 
fiddles playing, like Grrammont's French dandies attacking 
the breach of Lerida. 

" Cease, cease to ask her name," he writes of a young 
lady at the Wells at Tunbridge, whom he salutes with a 
magnificent compliment — 

*' Cease, cease to ask her name, 
The crowned Muse's noblest theme, 



Lady Plyant. — Nay, nay, rise up ; come, you shall see my good-nature. I know 
love is powerful, and nobody can help his passion. 'Tis not your fault; nor I 
swear, it is not mine. How can I help it, if I have charms 1 And how can you 
help it, if you are made a captive ? I swear it is pity it should be a fault ; but, my 
honour. Well, but your honour, too — but the sin ! Well, but the necessity. O 
Lord, here's somebody coming. I dare not stay. Well, you must consider of your 
crime ; and strive as much as can be against it — strive, be sure ; but don't be mei- 
ancholick — don't despair ; but never think that I'll grant you anything. O Lord, 
no ; but be sure you lay all thoughts aside of the marriage, for though I know you 
don't love Cynthia, only as a blind for your passion to me ; yet it will make me 
jealous. O Lord, what did I say ? Jealous ! No, I can't be jealous ; for I must 
not love you ; therefore don't hope ; but don't despair neither. They're coming ; 1 
must fly. — The Double Dealer. Act 2nd, scene v. page 156. 

' " There seems to be a strange affectation in authors of appearing to have done 
everything by chance. The Old Bachelor was written for amusement in the lir. 
guor of convalescence. Yet it is apparently composed with great elaborateness oJ 
dialogue, and incessant ambition of wit." Johnsom. 7j«.«. of*A.o P«./e 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 67 

Whose glory by immortal fame 

Shall only sounded be. 
But if you long to know, 
Then look round yonder dazzling row, 
Who most does like an angel show 

You may be sure 'tis she." 

Here are lines about another beauty, who perhaps was 
not so well pleased at the poet's manner of celebrating 
her — 

" When Lesbia first I saw, so heavenly fair. 
With eyes so bright and with that awful air, 
I thought my heart would durst so high aspire 
As bold as his who snatched celestial fire. 
But soon as e'er the beauteous idiot spoke. 
Forth from her coral lips such folly broke ; 
Like balm the trickling nonsense heal'd my wound, 
And what her eyes enthralled, her tongue unbound." 

Amoret is a cleverer woman than the lovely Lesbia, but 
the poet does not seem to respect one much more than the 
other ; and describes both with exquisite satirical humour — 

" Fair Amoret is gone astray, 

Pursue and seek her every lover ; 
I'll tell the signs by which you may 

The wandering shepherdess discover. 
Coquet and coy at once her air. 

Both studied, though both seem neglected ; 
Careless she is with artful care, 

Affecting to be unaffected. 

With skill her eyes dart every glance. 

Yet change so soon you'd ne'er suspect them ; 

For she'd persuade they wound by chance. 
Though certain aim and art direct them. 

She likes herself, yet others hates 

For that in which herself she prizes ; 
And, while she laughs at them, forgets 

She is the thing which she despises." 

What could Amoret have done to bring down such shafts 
of ridicule upon her ? Could she have resisted the irrre- 



68 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

sistible Mr. Congreve ? Could anybody ? Could Sabina, 
when she woke and heard such a bard singing under her 
window. See, he writes — 

" See ! see, she wakes — Sabina wakes ! 

And now the sun begins to rise : 
Less glorious is the morn, that breaks 

From his bright beams, than her fair eyes. 
With light united day they give ; 

But different fates ere night fulfil : 
How many by his warmth will live ! 

How many will her coldness kill !" 

Are you melted ? Do not you think him a divine man ? 
If not touched by the brilliant Sabina, hear the devout Se- 
linda : — 

" Pious Selinda goes to prayers, 

If 1 but ask her favour ; 
And yet the silly fool 's in tears, 

If she believes I'll leave her. 
Would I were free from this restraint, 

Or else had hopes to win her : 
Would she could make of me a saint, 

Or I of her a sinner !" 

What a conquering air there is about these ! What an 
irresistible Mr. Congreve it is ! Sinner ! of course he will 
be a sinner, the delightful rascal ! Win her ; of course he 
will win her, the victorious rogue ! He knows he will : he 
must — with such a grace, with such a fashion, with such 
a splendid embroidered suit — you see him with red-heeled 
shoes deliciously turned out, passing a fair jewelled hand 
through his dishevelled periwig, and delivering a killing 
ogle along with his scented billet ? And Sabina ? What 
a comparison that is between the nymph and the sun ! 
The sun gives Sabina the pas, and does not venture to rise 
before her ladyship : the morn's bright beams are less glo- 
rious than her fair eyes : but before night everybody will 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 69 

be frozen by her glances : everybody but one lucky rogue 
who shall be nameless : Louis Q,uatorze in all his glory is 
hardly more splendid than our Phcebus Apollo of the Mall 
and Spring Grarden.* 

"When Voltaire came to visit the great Congreve, the lat- 
ter rather affected to despise his literary reputation, and in 
this perhaps the great Congreve was not far wrong." A 
touch of Steele's tenderness is worth all his finery — a flash 
of Swift's lightning — a beam of Addison's pure sunshine, 
and his tawdry play-house taper is invisible. But the la- 
dies loved him, and he was undoubtedly a pretty fellow.' 

' " Among those by whom it (' Wills's') was frequented, Southerne and Congreve 

were principally distinguished by Dryden's friendship But Congreve seems 

to have gained yet farther than Southerne upon Dryden's friendship. He was in- 
troduced to him by his first play, the celebrated ' Old Bachelor' being put into the 
poet's hands to be revised. Dryden, after making a few alterations to fit it for the 
stage, returned it to the author with the high and just commendation, that it was 
the best first play he had ever seen." — Scott's Dryden, vol. i. p. 370. 

' It was in Surrey-street, Strand (where he afterwards died), that Voltaire vis- 
ited him, in the decline of his life. 

The anecdote in the text, relating to his saying that he wished " to be visited on 
no other footing than as a gentleman who led a life of plainness and simplicity," is 
common to all writers on the subject of Congreve, and appears in the English ver- 
sion of Voltaire's Letters concerning the English nation, published in London, 1733, 
as also in Goldsmith's " Memoir of Voltaire." But it is worthy of remark, that it 
does not appear in the text of the same Letters in the edition of Voltaire's CEuvres 
Completes in the Pantheon Litteraire. Vol. v. of his works. (Paris, 1837.) 

" Celui de tous Jes Anglais qui a porte le plus loin la gloire du theatre comique 
est feu M. Congreve. II n'a fait que peu de pieces, mais toutes sont excellentes 
dans leur genre. . . . Vous y voyez partout le langage des honnetes gens avec des 
actions de fripon ; ce qui prouve qu'il connaissait bien son monde, et qu'il vivait 
dans ce qu'on appelle la bonne compagnie." — Voltaire. Lettres sur les Anglais, 
Let. 19. 

^ On the death of Queen Mary, he published a Pastoral — " The Mourning Muse 
of Alexis." Alexis and Menalcas sing alternately in the orthodox way. The 
Queen is called Pastora. 

" I mourn Pastora dead, let Albion mourn, 
And sable clouds her chalky cliffs adorn," 



70 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

We have seen in Swift a humorous philosopher, whose 
truth frightens one, and whose laughter makes one melan- 

says Alexis. Among other phenomena, we learn that — 

" With their sharp nails themselves the Satyrs wound, 
And tug their shaggy beards, and bite with grief the ground," — 

(a degree of sensibility not always found in the Satyrs of that period !) It 

continues — 

" Lord of these woods and wide extended plains, 
Stretch'd on the ground and close to earth his face. 
Scalding with tears the already faded grass. 

To dust must all that Heavenly beauty come ? 
And must Pastora moulder in the tomb ? 
Ah Death ! more fierce and unrelenting far, 
Than wildest wolves and savage tigers are ; 
With lambs and sheep their hunger is appeased, 
But ravenous Death the shepherdess has seized." 
This statement that a wolf eats but a sheep, whilst Death eats a shepherdess ; 
that figure of the " Great Shepherd," lying speechless on his stomach, in a state of 
despair which neither winds nor floods nor air can exhibit, are to be remembered in 
poetry surely, and this style was admired in its time by the admirers of the great 
Congreve ! 

In the "Tears of Amaryllis for Amyntas" (the young Lord Blandford, the great 
Duke of Marlborough's only son), Amaryllis represents Sarah Duchess ! 

The tigers and wolves, nature and motion, rivers and echoes, come in to work 
here again. At the sight of her grief — 

" Tigers and wolves their wonted rage forego. 
And dumb distress and new compassion show, 
Nature herself attentive silence kept. 
And motion seemed suspended while she wept .'" — 
And Pope dedicated the Iliad to the author of these lines — and Dryden wrote to 
him in his great hand : 

" Time, place, and action may with pains be wrought. 
But Genius must be born, and never can be taught. 
'This is your portion, this your native store ; 
Heaven, that but once was prodigal before. 
To Sn.'kKsPEARE gave as much she could not give him more. 

Maintain your Post : that's all the Fame you need. 
For 'tis impossible you should proceed ; 
Already I am worn with cares and age. 
And just abandoning th' ungrateful Stage : 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 71 

choly. "We have had in Congreve a humorous observer of 
another school to whom the world seems to have no moral 
at all, and whose ghastly doctrine seems to be that we 
should eat, drink, and be merry when we can, and go to 
the deuce (if there be a deuce) when the time comes. "We 
come now to a humour that flows from quite a different 
heart and spirit — a wit that makes us laugh and leaves us 
good and happy ; to one of the kindest benefactors that so- 
ciety has ever had, and I believe you have divined already 
that I am about to mention Addison's honoured name. 

From reading over his writings, and the biographies 
which we have of him, amongst which the famous article 
in the Edinburgh Review' may be cited as a magnificent 

Unprofitably kept at Heaven's expence, 

I live a Rent-charge upon Providence : 

But you whom every Muse and Grace adorn, 

Whom I foresee to better fortune born, 

Be kind to my remains, and oh defend 

Against your Judgment your departed Friend ! 

Let not the insulting Foe my Fame pursue ; 

But shade those Laurels which descend to You : 

And take for Tribute what these Lines express ; 

You merit more, nor could my Love do less." 
This is a very different manner of welcome to that of our own day. In Shadwell, 
Higgons, Congreve, and the comic authors of their time, when gentlemen meet they 
fall into each other's arms, with " Jack, Jack, I must buss thee ;" or " Fore George, 
Harry, I must kiss thee, lad." And in a similar manner the poets saluted their 
brethren. Literary gentlemen do not kiss now ; I wonder if they love each other 
better. 

Steele calls Congreve " Great Sir" and " Great Author ;" says, " Well-dressed 
barbarians knew his awful name," and addresses him as if he were a prince ; and 
speaks of " Pastora" as one of the most famous tragic compositions. 

* To Addison himself we are bound by a sentiment as much like affection as any 
sentiment can be which is inspired by one who has been sleeping a hundred and 
twenty years in Westminster Abbey. ...".." After full inquiry and impartial 
reflection we have long been convinced that he deserved as much love and esteem 
as can justly be claimed by any of our infirm and erring race." — Macaulay. 



72 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

statue of the great writer and moralist of the last age, 
raised by the love and the marvellous skill and genius of 
one of the most illustrious artists of our own ; looking at 
that calm, fair face, and clear countenance — those chiselled 
features pure and cold, I cannot but fancy that this great 
man, in this respect, like him of whom we spoke in the last 
lecture, was also one of the lonely ones of the world. Such 
men have very few equals, and they do not herd with those. 
It is in the nature of such lords of intellect to be solitary — 
they are in the world but not of it ; and our minor strug- 
gles, brawls, successes, pass under them. 

Kind, just, serene, impartial, his fortitude not tried be- 
yond easy endurance, his affections not much used, for his 
books were his family, and his society was in public ; ad- 
mirably wiser, wittier, calmer, and more instructed than 
almost every man with whom he met, how could Addison 
suffer, desire, admire, feel much ? I may expect a child 
to admire me for being taller or writing more cleverly than 
she; but how can I ask my superior to say that I am a 
wonder when he knows better than I ? In Addison's days 
you could scarcely show him a literary performance, a ser- 
mon, or a poem, or a piece of literary criticism, but he felt 
he could do better. His justice must have made him in- 
different. He did not praise, because he measured his 



" Many who praise virtue do no more than praise it. Yet it is reasonable to be- 
lieve that Addison's profession and practice were at no great variance ; since, 
amidst that storm of faction in which most of his life was passed, though his sta- 
tion made him conspicuous, and his activity made him formidable, the character 
given him by his friends was never contradicted by his enemies. Of those with 
whom interest or opinion united him, he had not only the esteem but the kindness ; 
and of others, whom the violence of opposition drove against him, though he might 
lose the love, he retained the reverence." — Johnson. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 73 

compeers by a higher standard than common people have.* 
How was he who was so tall to look up to any but the loft- 
iest genius ? He must have stooped to put himself on a 
level with most men. By that profusion of graciousness 
and smiles, with which Goethe or Scott, for instance, greet- 
ed almost every literary beginner, every small literary ad- 
venturer who came to his court and went away charmed 
from the great king's audience, and cuddling to his heart 
the compliment which his literary majesty had paid him 
—each of the two good-natured potentates of letters brought 
their star and riband into discredit. Everybody had his 
Majesty's orders. Everybody had his Majesty's cheap por- 
trait, on a box surrounded with diamonds worth twopence 
a piece. A very great and just and wise man ought not 
to praise indiscriminately, but give his idea of the truth. 
Addison praises the ingenious Mr. Pinkethman: Addison 
praises the ingenious Mr. Doggett the actor, whose benefit 
is coming off that night : Addison praises Don Saltero : Ad- 
dison praises Milton with all his heart, bends his knee and 
frankly pays homage to that imperial genius.'' But be- 

' " Addison was perfect good company with intimates, and had something more 
charming in his conversation than I over knew in any other man ; but with any mixt- 
ure of strangers, and sometimes only with one, he seemed to preserve his dignity 
much, with a stiff sort of silence." — Pope {Spencers Anecdotes). 

2 " Milton's chief talent, and indeed his distinguishing excellence, lies in the sub- 
limity of his thoughts. There are others of the modern, who rival him in every 
other part of poetry ; but in the greatness of his sentiments he triumphs over all the 
poets, both modern and ancient. Homer alone excepted. It is impossible for the 
imagination of man to disturb itself with greater ideas than those which he has laid 
together in his first, second, and sixth books." — Spectator, No. 279. 

" If I were to name a poet that is a perfect master in all these arts of working on 
the imagination, I think Milton may pass for one." — Ibid. No. 417. 

These famous papers appeared in each Saturday's Spectator, from January IQtli 
to May 3d, 1712. Besides his services to Milton, we may place those he did to Sa- 
cred Music. 



74 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

tween those degrees of his men his praise is very scanty. 
I do not think the great Mr. Addison hked young Mr. Pope, 
the Papist, much ; I do not think he abused him. But 
when Mr. Addison's men abused Mr. Pope, I do not think 
Addison took his pipe out of his mouth to contradict them.* 
Addison's father was a clergyman of good repute in Wilt- 
shire, and rose in the church." His famous son never lost 
his clerical txaining and scholastic gravity, and was called 
" a parson in a tye-wig"^ in London afterwards at a time 
when tye-wigs were only worn by the laity, and the fathers 
of theology did not think it decent to appear except in a full 
bottom. Having been at school at Salisbury, and the Char- 
terhouse, in 1687, when he was fifteen years old he went 



* " Addison was very kind to me at first, but my bitter enemy afterwards." — 
Pope (Spence's Anecdotes). 

" ' Leave him as soon as you can,' said Addison to me, speaking of Pope ; ' he 
will certainly play you some devilish trick else : he has an appetite to satire.'" — 
Lady Wortley Montagu {Spence's Anecdotes). 

^ Lancelot Addison, his father, was the son of another Lancelot Addison, a cler- 
gyman in Westmoreland. Ho became Dean of Lichfield and Archdeacon of Cov- 
entry. 

' " The remark of Mandeville, who, when he had passed an evening in his com 
pany, declared that he was ' a parson in a tye-wig,' can detract little from his char- 
acter. He was always reserved to strangers, and was not incited to uncommon free- 
dom by a character like that of Mandeville." — Johnson {Lives of the Poets). 

" Old Jacob Tonson did not like Mr. Addison ; he had a qnarrrl with him, and, 
after his quitting the secretaryship, used frequently to say of him — ' One day or 
other you'll see that man a bishop — I'm sure he looks that way ; and indeed I ever 
thought him a priest in his heart.' " — Pope (S])ence's Anecdotes). 

" Mr. Addison staid above a year at Blois. He would rise as early as between 
two and three in the height of summer, and lie a bed till between eleven and twelve 
in the depth of winter. He was untalkative whilst here, and often thoughtful : 
sometimes so lost in thought, that I have come into his room and staid five minutes 
there before ho has known anything of it. He had his masters generally at supper 
with him ; kept very little company beside ; and had no amour whilst too, that I 
know of; and I think I should have known it, if he had had any." — Abbe Philip- 
PEAUX of Blois (Sprjice's Anecdotes), 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 75 

to Q,ueen's College, Oxford, where he speedily began to dis- 
tinguish himself by the making of Latin verses. The beau- 
tiful and fanciful poem of " The Pigmies and the Cranes" 
is still read by lovers of that sort of exercise, and verses are 
extant in honour of King William by w^hich it appears that 
it was the loyal youth's custom to toast that sovereign in 
bumpers of purple Lyeeus ; and many more works are in 
the Collection, including one on the peace of Ryswick, in 
1697, which was so good that Montague got him a pension 
of 300/. a year, on which Addison set out on his travels. 

During his ten years at Oxford, Addison had deeply im- 
bued himself with the Latin poetical literature, and had 
these poets at his fingers' ends when he travelled in Italy.* 
His patron went out of office, and his pension was unpaid : 
and hearing that this great scholar, now eminent and known 
to the literati of Europe (the great Boileau,'' upon perusal 
of Mr. Addison's elegant hexameters, was first made aware 
that England was not altogether a barbarous nation) — 
hearing that the celebrated Mr. Addison, of Oxford, proposed 
to travel as governor to a young gentleman on the grand 
tour, the great Duke of Somerset proposed to Mr. Addison 
to accompany his son, Lord Hartford. 

Mr. Addison was delighted to be of use to his Grace and 
his lordship, his Grrace's son, and expressed himself ready 
to set forth. 

His Grace the Duke of Somerset now announced to one 
of the most famous scholars of Oxford and Europe that it 

* " His knowledge of the Latin poets, from Lucretius and Catullus, down to 
Claudian and Prudentius, was singularly exact and profound." — Macaulay. 

* " Our country owes it to him, that the famous Monsieur Boileau first conceived 
an opinion of the English genius for poetry, by perusing the present he made him 
of the MuscB Anglicance." — TlCKELL {Preface to Addison's Works). 



76 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

was his gracious intention to allow my Lord Hartford's 
tutor one hundred guineas per annum. Mr. Addison wrote 
hack that his services were his Grace's, but he by no means 
found his account in the recompense for them. The nego- 
tiation was broken off. They parted with a profusion of 
congees on one side and the other. 

Addison remained abroad for some time, living in the 
best society of Europe. How could he do otherwise ? He 
must have been one of the finest gentlemen the world ever 
saw : at all moments of life serene and courteous, cheerful 
and calm.' He could scarcely ever have had a degraded 
thought. He might have omitted a virtue or two, or many, 
but could not have had many faults committed for which 
he need blush or turn pale. When warmed into confi- 
dence, his conversation appears to have been so delightful 
that the greatest wits sate wrapt and charmed to listen to 
him. No man bore poverty and narrow fortune with a 
more lofty cheerfulness. His letters to his friends at this 
period of his life when he had lost his government pension, 
and given up his college chances, are full of courage and a 
gay confidence and philosophy : and they are none the 
worse in my eyes, and I hope not in those of his last and 
greatest biographer (though Mr. Macaulay is bound to own 
and lament a certain weakness for wine, which the great 
and good Joseph Addison notoriously possessed, in common 
with countless gentlemen of his time), because some of the 
letters are written when his honest hand was shaking a 
little in the morning after libations to purple Lyaeus over- 



> " It was my fate to be much with the wits ; my father was acquainted with all 
of them. Addison was the best company in the world. I never knew anybody that 
had so much wit as Congreve." — Lady Wort ley Montagu {Spence's Anecdotes). 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 77 

night. He was fond of drinking the healths of his friends : 
he writes to Wyche/ of Hamburgh, gratefully remembering 
Wyche's " hoc." " I have been drinking your health to- 
day with Sir Richard Shirley," he writes to Bathurst. " I 
have lately had the honour to meet my Lord Effingham at 
Amsterdam, where we have drunk Mr. "Wood's health a 
hundred times in excellent champagne," he writes again. 
Swift" describes him over his cups, when Joseph yielded to 

* mr. addison to mr. wyche. 

"Dear Sir, 

" My hand at present begins to grow steady enough for a letter, so the prop- 
erest use I can put it to is to thank ye honest gentleman that set it a shaking. I 
have had this morning a desperate design in my head to attack you in verse, which 
I should certainly have done could I have found out a rhyme to rummer. But 
though you have escaped for ye present, you are not yet out of danger, if I can a 
little recover my talent at Crambo. I am sure, in whatever way I write to you, it 
will be impossible for me to express ye deep sense I have of ye many favours you 
have lately shown me. I shall only tell you that Hambourg has been the pleasant- 
est stage I have met with in my travails. If any of my friends wonder at me for 
living so long in that place, I dare say it will be thought a very good excuse when I 
tell him Mr. Wyche was there. As your company made our stay at Hambourg 
agreeable, your wine has given us all ye satisfaction that we have found in our 
journey through Westphalia. If drinking your health will do you any good, you 
may expect to be as long lived as Methusaleh, or, to use a more familiar instance, 
as ye oldest hoc in ye cellar. I hope ye two pair of legs that was left a swelling 
behind us are by this time come to their shapes again. I cannot forbear troubling 
you with my hearty respects to ye owners of them, and desiring you to believe me 
always, " Dear Sir, yours, &c. 

" To Mr. Wyche, His Majesty's Resident at Hambourg, May, 1703." 

— From the " Life of Addisoji," by Miss Aikin. Vol. i. p. 146. 

' It is pleasing to remember, that the relation between Swift and Addison was, 
on the whole, satisfactory, from first to last. The value of Swift's testimony, when 
nothing personal inflamed his vision or warped his judgment, can be doubted by no- 
body. 

" Sept. 10, 1710. — I sat till ten in the evening with Addison and Steele. 

" 11. — Mr. Addison and I dined together at his lodgings, and I sat with him part 
of this evening. 

" 18. — To-day I dined with Mr. Stratford at Mr. Addison's retirement near Chel- 
sea I will get what good offices I can from Mr. Addison. 



78 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

a temptation which Jonathan resisted. Joseph was of a 
cold nature, and needed perhaps the fire of wine to warm 
his blood. If he was a parson : he wore a tye-wig, recol- 
lect. A better and more Christian man scarcely ever 
breathed than Joseph Addison. If he had not that little 
weakness for wine — why, we could scarcely have found a 
fault with him, and could not have liked him as we do.' 

At thirty-three years of age, this most distinguished wit, 
scholar, and gentleman was without a profession and an 
income. His book of " Travels" had failed : his " Dia- 
logues on Medals" had had no particular success : his Lat- 
in verses, even though reported the best since Virgil, or 
Statius at any rate, had not brought him a Grovernment- 
place, and Addison was living up two shabby pair of stairs 
in the Haymarket (in a poverty over which old Samuel 
Johnson rather chuckles), when in these shabby rooms, an 

" 27. — To-day all our company dined at Will Frankland's, with Steele and Ad- 
dison, too. 

" 29. — I dined with Mr. Addison, &c." — Journal to Stella. 

Addison inscribed a presentation copy of his Travels " To Dr. Jonathan Swift, 
the most agreeable companion, the truest friend, and the greatest genius of his age." 
— (Scott. From the information of Mr. Theophilus Swift.) 

" Mr. Addison, who goes over first secretaiy, is a most excellent person ; and be- 
ing my most intimate friend, I shall use all my credit to set hmi right in his notions 
of persons and things." — Letters. 

" I examine my heart, and can find no other reason why I write to you now, be- 
sides that great love and esteem I have always had for you. I have nothing to ask 
you either for my friend or for myself" — Swift to Addison (1717). Scott's 
Swift. Vol. xix. p. 274. 

Political differences only dulled for a while their friendly communications. Time 
renewed them ; and Tickell enjoyed Swift's friendship as a legacy from the man 
with whose memory his is so honourably connected. 

1 " Addison usually studied all the morning ; then met his party at Button's ; 
dined there, and stayed five or six hours, and sometimes far into the night. I was 
of the company for about a year, but found it too much for me : it hurt my health, 
and so I quitted it." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes.) 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 79 

emissary from Government and Fortune came and found 
him.' A poem was wanted about the Duke of Marlbor- 
ough's victory of Blenheim. Would Mr. Addison write 
one ? Mr. Boyle, afterwards Lord Carleton, took back the 
reply to the Lord Treasurer Godolphin, that Mr. Addison 
would. When the poem had reached a certain stage, it 
was carried to Godolphin ; and the last lines which he read 
were these : — 

" But O, my muse ! what numbers wilt thou find 
To sing the furious troops in battle join'd ? 
Methinks I hear the drum's tumultuous sound, 
The victor's shouts and dying groans confound ; 
The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies, 
And all the thunders of the battle rise. 
'Twas then great Marlborough's mighty soul was proved, 
That, in the shock of charging hosts unmoved. 
Amidst confusion, horror, and despair, 
Examined all the dreadful scenes of war : 
In peaceful thought the field of death surveyed. 
To fainting squadrons lent the timely aid. 
Inspired repulsed battalions to engage. 
And taught the doubtful battle where to rage. 
So when an angel by divine command. 
With rising tempests shakes a guilty land 
(Such as of late o'er pale Britannia passed). 
Calm and serene he drives the furious blast ; 
And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform. 
Rides on the whirlwind and directs the storm." 

Addison left off at a good moment. That simile was 
pronounced to be of the greatest ever produced in poetry. 
That angel, that good angel, flew off with Mr. Addison, 
and landed him in the place of Commissioner of Appeals — 



* "When he returned to England (in 1702), with a meanness of appearance which 
gave testimony of the difficulties to which he had been reduced, he found his old 
patrons out of power, and was, therefore, for a time, at full leisure for the cultiva- 
tion of his mind." — Johnson (Lives of the Poets). 



80 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

vice Mr. Locke providentially promoted. In the following 
year, Mr. Addison went to Hanover with Lord Halifax, 
and the year after was made Under-Secretary of State. 
angel visits ? you come " few and far between" to lit- 
erary gentlemen's lodgings ! Your wings seldom quiver at 
second-floor windows now ! 

You laugh ? You think it is in the power of few writ- 
ers now-a-days to call up such an angel ? Well perhaps 
not ; hut permit us to comfort ourselves by pointing out 
that there are in the poem of the " Campaign" some as 
had lines as heart can desire : and to hint that Mr. Addi- 
son did very wisely in not going further with my Lord 
Grodolphin than that angelical simile. Do allow me, just 
for a little harmless mischief, to read you some of the lines 
which follow. Here is the interview between the Duke 
and the King of the Romans after the battle : — 

" Austria's young monarch, whose imperial sway 
Sceptres and thrones are destined to obey, 
Whose boasted ancestry so high extends 
That in the pagan Gods his lineage ends, 
Comes from afar, in gratitude to own 
The great supporter of his father's throne. 
What tides of glory to his bosom ran 
Clasped in th' embraces of the godlike man ! 
How were his eyes with pleasing wonder fixt, 
To see such fire with so much sweetness mixt ! 
Such easy greatness, such a graceful port, 
So learned and finished for the camp or court !" 

How many fourth-form boys at Mr. Addison's school of 
Charter-house could write as well as that now ? The 
" Campaign" has blunders, triumphant as it was ; and 
weak points like all campaigns.' 

' " Mr. Addison wrote very fluently ; but he was sometimes very slow and scru- 
pulous in correcting. He would show his verses to several friends ; and would 



CONGREVE AND ADDI60N. 81 

111 the year 1718 " Cato" came out. Swift has left a 
description of the first night of the performance. All the 
laurels of Europe were scarcely sufficient for the author of 
this prodigious poem.' Laudations of Whig and Tory 
chiefs, popular ovations, complimentary garlands from lit- 
erary men, translations in all languages, delight and hom- 
age from all — save from John Dennis in a minority of one 
— Mr. Addison was called the " great Mr. Addison" after 
this. The Coffee-house Senate saluted him Divus : it 
was heresy to question that decree. 



alter almost everything that any of them hinted at as wrong. He seemed to be tor. 
diffident of himself ; and too much concerned about his character as a poet ; or (as 
he worded it), too solicitous for that kind of praise, which, God knows, is but a 
very little matter after all !" — Pope (Spence's Anecdotes). 

' " As to poetical affairs," says Pope, in 1713, " I am content at present to be a 

bare looker-on Cato was not so much the wonder of Rome in his days, aa 

he is of Britain in ours ; and though all the foolish industry possible has been used 
to make it thought a party play, yet what the author once said of another may the 
most properly in the world be applied to him on this occasion : 

" ' Envy itself is dumb — in wonder lost ; 

And factions strive who shall applaud him most.' 
" The numerous and violent claps of the Whig party on the one side of the thea- 
tre were echoed back by the Tories on the other; while the author sweated behind 
the scenes with concern to find their applause proceeding more from the hands 

than the head I believe you have heard that, after all the applauses of the 

opposite faction, my Lord Bolingbroke sent for Booth, who played Cato, into the 
box, and presented him with fifty guineas in acknowledgment (as he expressed it) 
for defending the cause of liberty so well against a perpetual dictator." — Pope's 
Letter to Sir W. Trumbull. 

Cato ran for thirty-five nights without interruption. Pope wrote the Prologue, 
and Garth the Epilogue. 

It is worth noticing how many things in Cato keep their ground as habitual quo- 
tations, e. g. : — 

" . . . . big with the fate 
Of Cato and of Rome." 

" 'Tis not in mortals to command success. 
But we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it." 



82 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



Meanwhile he was writing political papers and advanc- 
ing in the political profession. He went Secretary to Ire- 
land. He was appointed Secretary of State in 1717. And 
letters of his are extant, bearing date some year or two 
before, and written to young Lord "Warwick, in which he 
addresses him as " my dearest lord," and asks affectionately 
about his studies, and writes very prettily about nightin- 
gales, and birds'-nests, which he has found at Fulham for 
his lordship. Those nightingales were intended to warble 
in the ear of Lord Warwick's mamma. Addison married 
her ladyship in 1716 ; and died at Holland House three 
years after that splendid but dismal union.* 

" Blesses his stars, and thinks it luxury." 

" I think the Romans call it Stoicism." 

" My voice is still for war." 

" When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, 
The post of honour is a private station." 
Not to mention — 

" The woman who deliberates is lost." 
And the eternal — 

" Plato, thou reasonest well," 
which avenges, perhaps, on the public their neglect of the play ! 

1 " The lady was persuaded to marry him on terms much like those on which a 
Turkish princess is espoused, — to whom the Sultan is reported to pronounce, 
' Daughter, I give thee this man for thy slave.' The marriage, if uncontradicted 
report can be credited, made no addition to his happiness ; it neither found them, 

nor made them, equal Rowe's ballad of ' The Despairing Shepherd' is 

said to have been written, either before or after marriage, upon this memorable 
pair." — Dr. Johnson. 

" I received the news of Mr. Addison's being declared Secretary of State with 
the less surprise, in that I knew that post was almost offered to him before. At 
that time he declined it, and I really believe that he would have done well to have 
declined it now. Such a post as that, and such a wife as the Countess, do not 
seem to be, in prudence, eligible for a man that is asthmatic, and we may see the 
day when he will be heartily glad to resign them both." — Lady Woktley Mon- 
tagu TO Pope. Works, Lord WhariicUffc's edit., vol. ii. p. 111. 

The issue of this marriage was a daughter, Charlotte Addison, who inherited, on 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 83 

But it is not for his reputation as the great author of 
" Cato" and the " Campaign," or for his merits as Secre- 
tary of State, or for his rank and high distinction as my 
Lady "Warwick's husband, or for his eminence as an Ex- 
aminer of political questions on the Whig side, or a Gruard- 
ian of British liberties, that we admire Joseph Addison. 
It is as a Tatler of small talk and a Spectator of mankind, 
that we cherish and love him, and owe as much pleasure 
to him as to any human being that ever wrote. He came 
in that artificial age, and began to speak with his noble, 
natural voice. He came, the gentle satirist, who hit no 
unfair blow ; the kind judge who castigated only in smil- 
ing. While Swift went about, hanging and ruthless — a 
literary Jeffries — in Addison's kind court only minor cases 
were tried : only peccadilloes and small sins against society : 
only a dangerous libertinism in tuckers and hoops ;' or a 

her mother's death, the estate of Bilton, near Rugby, which her father had purchased, 
and died, unmarried, at an advanced age. She was of weak intellect. 

Rowe appears to have been faithful to Addison during his courtship, for his Col- 
lection contains ' Stanzas to Lady Warwick, on Mr. Addison's going to Ireland,' in 
which her ladyship is called ' Chloe,' and Joseph Addison, ' Lycidas ;' besides the 
ballad mentioned by the Doctor, and which is entitled ' Colin's Complaint.' But 
not even the interest attached to the name of Addison could induce the reader to 
peruse this composition, though one stanza may serve as a specimen : — ■ 
" What though I have skill to complain — 

Though the Muses ray temples have crowned ; 

What though, when they hear my sweet strain, 

The Muses sit weeping around. 

" Ah, Colin ! thy hopes are in vain ; 
Thy pipe and thy laurel resign ; 
Thy false one inclines to a swain 
Whose music is sweeter than thine. 
* One of the most humorous of these is the paper on Hoops, which, the " Spec- 
tator" tells us, particularly pleased his friend Sir Roger. 
" Mr. Spectator, 

"You have diverted the town almost a whole month at the expense of the 



84 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

nuisance in the abuse of beaux' canes and snuff-boxes. 
It may be a lady is tried for breaking the peace of our sov- 
ereign lady Queen Anne, and ogling too dangerous from 
the side-box : or a Templar for beating the watch, or 
breaking Priscian's head : or a citizen's wife for caring 
too much for the puppet-show, and too little for her hus- 
band and children : every one of the little sinners brought 



country ; it is now high time that you should give the country their revenge. Since 
your withdrawing from this place, the fair sex are run into great extravagancies. 
Their petticoats, which began to heave and swell before you left us, are now blowTi 
up into a most enormous concave, and rise every day more and more ; in short, Sir, 
since our women knew themselves to be out of the eye of the Spectator, they 
■will be kept within no compass. You praised them a little too soon, for the mod- 
esty of their head-dresses ; for as the humour of a sick person is often driven out 
of one limb into another, their superfluity of ornaments, instead of being entirely 
banished, seems only fallen from their heads upon their lower parts. What they 
have lost in height they make up in breadth, and, contrary to all rules of architec- 
ture, widen the foundations at the same time that they shorten the superstructure. 

" The women give out, in defence of these wide bottoms, that they are very airy 
and very proper for the season ; but this I look upon to be only a pretence and a 
piece of art, for it is well known we have not had a more moderate summer these 
many years, so that it is certain the heat they complain of cannot be in the weather; 
besides, I would fain ask these tender-constitutioned ladies, why they should re- 
quire more cooling than their mothers before them ? 

" I find several speculative persons are of opinion that our sex has of late years 
been very saucy, and that the hoop-petticoat is made use of to keep us at a distance. 
It is most certain that a woman's honour cannot be better entrenched than after this 
manner, in circle within circle, amidst such a variety of out-works and lines of 
circumvallation. A female who is thus invested in whalebone is sufficiently secured 
against the approaches of an ill-bred fellow, who might as well think of Sir George 
Etheridge's way of making love in a tub as in the midst of so many hoops. 

" Among these various conjectures, there are men of superstitious tempers who 
look upon the hoop-petticoat as a kind of prodigy. Some will have it that it por- 
tends the downfall of the French king, and observes, that the farthingale appeared 
in England a little before the ruin of the Spanish monarchy. Others arc of opinion 
that it foretells battle and blood-shed, and believe it of the same prognostication as 
the tail of ft blazing star. For my part, I am apt to think that it is a sign that mul- 
titudes are coming into the world rather than going out of it," &c. &c. — Spectator, 
No. 127. 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 85 

before him are amusing, and he dismisses each with the 
pleasantest penalties and the most charming words of ad- 
\ monition. 

Addison wrote his papers as gaily as if he was gomg out 
for a holiday. When Steele's " Tatler" first began his prat- 
tle, Addison, then in Ireland, caught at his friend's notion, 
poured in paper after paper, and contributed the stores of 
his mind, the sweet fruits of his reading, the delightful 
gleanings of his daily observation, with a wonderful profu- 
sion, and as it seemed an almost endless fecundity. He 
was six-and-thirty years old: full and ripe. He had not 
worked crop after crop from his brain, manuring hastily, 
subsoiling indifferently, cutting and sowing and cutting 
again, like other luckless cultivators of letters. He had 
not done much as yet ; a few Latin poems — graceful pro- 
lusions ; a polite book of travels ; a dissertation on medals, 
not very deep ; four acts of a tragedy, a great classical ex- 
ercise; and the " Campaign," a large prize poem that won 
an enormous prize. But with his friend's discovery of the 
" Tatler," Addison's calling was found, and the most de- 
lightful talker in the world began to speak. He does not 
go very deep : let gentlemen of a profound genius, critics 
accustomed to the plunge of the bathos, console themselves 
by thinking that he could not go very deep. There are no 
traces of suffering in his writing. He was so good, so 
honest, so healthy, so cheerfully selfish, if I must use the 
word. There is no deep sentiment. I doubt, until after 
his marriage, perhaps, whether he ever lost his night's rest 
or his day's tranquillity about any woman in his life :' 

' " Mr. Addison has not had one epithalaraium that I can hear of, and must even be 
reduced, like a poorer and a better poet, Spenser, to make his own." — Pope's Letters. 



86 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

whereas poor Dick Steele had capacity enough to melt, 
and to languish, and to sigh, and to cry his honest old eyes 
out, for a dozen. His writings do not show insight into or 
reverence for the love of women which I take to be, one 
the consequence of the other. He walks about the world 
watching their pretty humours, fashions, follies, flirtations, 
rivalries ; and noting them with the most charming arch- 
ness. He sees them in public, in the theatre, or the as- 
sembly, or the puppet-show; or at the toy-shop higgling 
for gloves and lace; or at the auction, battling together 
over a blue porcelain dragon, or a darling monster in Ja- 
pan ; or at church, eyeing the width of their rivals' hoops, 
or the breadth of their laces, as they sweep down the 
aisles. Or he looks out of his window at the Grarter in 
St. James's Street, at Ardelia's coach, as she blazes to the 
drawing-room with her coronet and six footmen ; and re- 
membering that her father was a Turkey merchant in the 
city, calculates how many sponges went to purchase her 
earring, and how many drums of figs to build her coach- 
box ; or he demurely watches behind a tree in Spring G-ar- 
den as Saccharissa (whom he knows under her mask) trips 
out of her chair to the alley where Sir Fopling is waiting. 
He sees only the public life of women. Addison was one 
of the most resolute clubmen of his day. He passed many 
hours daily in those haunts. Besides drinking, which alas ! 
is past praying for, it must be owned, ladies, that he in- 
dulged in that odious practice of smoking. Poor fellow ! 
He was a man's man, remember. The only woman he 
did know, he did not write about. I take it there would 
not have been much humour in that story. 

He likes to go and sit in the smoking-room at the Gre- 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 87 

cian, or the Devil; to pace 'Change and the Mall' — to 
mingle in that great club of the world — sitting alone in it 



^ " I have observed that a reader seldom peruses a book with pleasure till he 
knows whether the writer of it be a black or a fair man, of a mild or a choleric disposi- 
tion, married or a bachelor; with other particulars of the like nature, that conduce 
very much to the right understanding of an author. To gratify this curiosity, which 
is so natural to a reader, I design this paper and my next as prefatory discourses to 
my following writings ; and shall give some account in them of the persons that are 
engaged in this work. As the chief trouble of compiling, digesting, and correcting 
will fall to my share, I must do myself the justice to open the work with my own his- 
tory There runs a story in the family, that when my mother was gone with 

child of me about three months, she dreamt that she was brought to bed of a judge. 
Whether this might proceed from a lawsuit which was then depending in the fam- 
ily, or my father's being a justice of the peace, I cannot determine ; for I am not so 
vain as to think it presaged any dignity that I should arrive at in my future life, 
though that was the interpretation which the neighbourhood put upon it. The grav- 
ity of my behaviour at my very first appearance in the world, and all the time that I 
sucked, seemed to favour my mother's dream ; for, as she has often told me, I threw 
away my rattle before I was two months old, and would not make use of my coral 
till they had taken away the bells from it. 

" As for the rest of my infancy, there being nothing in it remarkable, I shall pass 
it over in silence. I find that during my nonage I had the reputation of a very sul- 
len youth, but was always the favourite of my schoolmaster, who used to say that 
my parts were solid and would wear well. I had not been long at the university be- 
fore I distinguished myself by a most profound silence ; for during the space of 
eight years, excepting in the public exercises of the college, I scarce uttered the 
quantity of an hundred words ; and indeed, I do not remember that I ever spoke 
three sentences together in my whole life 

" I have passed my latter years in this city, where I am frequently seen in most 
public places, though there are not more than half-a-dozen of my select friends that 

know me There is no place of general resort wherein I do not often make 

my appearance ; sometimes I am seen thrusting my head into a round of politicians 
at Wills', and listening with great attention to the narratives that are made in these 
little circular audiences. Sometimes I smoke a pipe at Child's, and whilst I seem 
attentive to nothing but the Postman, overhear the conversation of every table in 
the room. I appear on Tuesday night at St. James's Coffee-house ; and sometimes 
join the little committee of politics in the inner room, as one who comes to hear and 
improve. My face is likewise very well known at the Grecian, the Cocoa-tree, and 
in the theatres both of Drury-Iane and the Haymarket. I have been taken for a 
merchant upon the Exchange for above these two years ; and sometimes pass for a 
Jew in the assembly of stock-jobbers at Jonathan's. In short, wherever I see a 



88 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

somehow: having good-will and kindness for every single 
man and woman in it — having need of some habit and cus- 
tom binding him to some few ; never doing any man a 
wrong (unless it be a wrong to hint a little doubt about a 
man's parts, and to damn him with faint praise) ; and so 
he loolcs on the world and plays with the ceaseless hu- 
mours of all of us — laughs the kindest laugh — points our 
neighbour's foible or eccentricity out to us with the most 
good-natured, smiling confidence ; and then, turning over 
his shoulder, whispers our foibles to our neighbour. What 
would Sir Roger de Coverley be without his follies and his 
charming little brain-cracks V If the good knight did not 
call out to the people sleeping in church, and say "Amen" 
with such a delightful pomposity : if he did not make a 
speech in the assize-court apropos de bottes, and merely to 
show his dignity to Mr. Spectator : ' if he did not mistake 

cluster of people, I mix with them, though I never open my own lips but in my own 
club. 

" Thus I live in the world rather as a ^Spectator' of mankind than as one of the 
species ; by which means I have made myself a speculative statesman, soldier, mer- 
chant, and artizan, without ever meddling in any practical part in life. I am very 
well versed in the theory of a husband or a father, and can discern the errors in the 
economy, business, and diversions of others, better than those who are engaged in 
them^ — as standers-by discover blots which are apt to escape those who are in the 
game. ... In short, I have acted, in all the parts of my life, as a looker-on, which 
is the character I intend to preserve in this paper." — Spectator, No. 1. 

^ " So effectually, indeed, did he retort on vice the mockery which had recently 
been directed against virtue, that, since his time, the open violation of decency has 
always been considered, amongst us, the sure mark of a fool." — Macaulay. 

' " The Court was sat before Sir Roger came ; but, notwithstanding all the jus 
tices had taken their places upon the bench, they made room for the old knight at 
the head of them ; who for his reputation in the country took occasion to whisper 
in the judge's ear that he was glad his lordship had met with so much good weather in 
his circuit. I was listening to the proceedings of the Court with much attention, 
and infinitely pleased with that great appearance and solemnity which so properly 
accompanies such a public administration of^our laws ; when, after about an hour's 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 89 

Madam Doll Tearsheet for a lady of quality in Temple 
Garden : if he were wiser than he is : if he had not his hu- 
mour to salt his life, and were but a mere English gentle- 
man and game-preserver — of what worth were he to us ? 
We love him for his vanities as much as his virtues. What 
is ridiculous is delightful in him : we are so fond of him 
because we laugh at him so. And out of that laughter, 
and out of that sweet weakness, and out of those harmless 
eccentricities and follies, and out of that touched brain, and 
out of that honest manhood and simplicity — we get a re- 
sult of happiness, goodness, tenderness, pity, piety ; such 
as, if my audience will think their reading and hearing over, 
doctors and divines but seldom have the fortune to inspire. 
And why not ? Is the glory of Heaven to be sung only by 
gentlemen in black coats ? Must the truth be only ex- 
pounded in gown and surplice, and out of those two vest- 
ments can nobody preach it ? Commend me to this dear 
preacher without orders — this parson in the tye- wig. When 
this man looks from the world whose weaknesses he describes 
so benevolently, up to the Heaven which shines over us all, 
I can hardly fancy a human face lighted up with a more se- 
rene rapture : a human intellect thrilling with a purer love 
and adoration than Joseph Addison's. Listen to him : from 



sitting, I observe to my great surprise, in the midst of a trial, that my friend Sir 
Roger was getting up to speak. I was in some pain for him, till I found he had ac- 
quitted himself of two or three sentences, with a look of much business and great 
intrepidity. 

" Upon his first rising the Court was hushed, and a general whisper ran among 
the country people that Sir Roger was up. The speech he made was so little to the 
purpose, that I shall not trouble my readers with an account of it, and I believe was 
not so much designed by the knight himself to inform tho Court, as to give him a 
figure in my eyes, and to keep up his credit in the country." — Spectator, No 
122. 



90 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

your childhood you have known the verses : but who can 
hear their sacred music without love and awe ? 

" Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
And nightly to the listening earth 
Repeats the story of her birth ; 
And all the stars that round her burn, 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll. 
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
What though, in solemn silence, all 
Move round this dark terrestrial ball ; 
What though no real voice nor sound. 
Among their radiant orbs be found ; 
In reason's ear they all rejoice, 
And utter forth a glorious voice, 
For ever singing as they shine, 
The hand that made us is divine." 

It seems to me those verses shine like the stars. They 
shine out of a great deep calm. "When he turns to Heaven, 
a Sabbath comes over that man's mind : and his face lights 
up from it with a glory of thanks and prayer. His sense 
of religion stirs through his whole being. In the fields, in 
the town : looking at the birds in the trees : at the children 
in the streets : in the morning or in the moonlight : over his 
books in his own room : in a happy party at a country mer- 
ry-making or a town assembly, good-will and peace to G-od's 
creatures, and love and awe of Him who made them, fill his 
pure heart and shine from his kind face. If Swift's life was 
the most wretched, I think Addison's was one of the most 
enviable. A life prosperous and beautiful — a calm death 
— an immense fame and affection afterwards for his happy 
and spotless name.' 



' Garth sent to Addison (of whom he had a very high opinion) on his death-bed, 



CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 91 

to ask him whether the Christian religion was true." — Dr. Young (^'perece's Anec- 
dotes). 

" I have always preferred cheerfulness to mirth. The latter I consider as an act, 
the former as an habit of the mind. Mirth is short and transient, cheerfulness fixed 
and permanent. Those are often raised into the greatest transports of mirth who 
are subject to the greatest depression of melancholy : on the contrary, cheerfulness, 
though it does not give the mind such an exquisite gladness, prevents us from fall- 
ing into any depths of sorrow. Mirth is like a flash of lightning that breaks through 
a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment ; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of day- 
light in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity." — Addison 
(Spectator, p. 381). 



LECTURE THE THIRD. 



STEELE. 

What do we look for in studying the history of a past 
age ? Is it to learn the political transactions and charac- 
ters of the leading public men? is it to make ourselves 
acquainted with the life and being of the time ? If we 
set out with the former grave purpose, where is the truth, 
and who believes that he has it entire ? What character 
of what great man is known to you ? You can but make 
guesses as to character more or less happy. In common 
life don't you often judge and misjudge a man's whole 
conduct, setting out from a wrong impression ? The tone 
of a voice, a word said in joke, or a trifle in behaviour — 
the cut of his hair or the tie of his neckcloth may disfigure 
him in your eyes, or poison your good opinion ; or at the 
end of years of intimacy it may be your closest friend says 
something, reveals something which had previously been a 
secret, which alters all your views about him, and shows 
that he has been acting on quite a different motive to that 
which you fancied you knew. And if it is so with those 
you know, how much more with those you do not know ? 
Say, for example, that I want to understand the character 
of the Duke of Marlborough. I read Swift's history of the 
times in which he took a part ; the shrewdest of observers 
and initiated, one would think, into the politics of the age 
— ho hints to me that Marlborough was a coward, and 



STEELE. 93 

even of doubtful military capacity : he speaks of Walpole 
as a contemptible boor, and scarcely mentions, except to 
flout it, the great intrigue of the Queen's latter days, 
which was to have ended in bringing back the Pretender. 
Again, I read Marlborough's life by a copious archdeacon, 
who has the command of immense papers, of sonorous lan- 
guage, of what is called the best information ; and I get 
little or no insight into this secret motive which I believe 
influenced the whole of Marlborough's career, which caused 
his turnings and windings, his opportune fidelity and trea- 
son, stopped his army almost at Paris gate, and landed 
him finally on the Hanoverian side — the winning side ; I 
get, I say, no truth or only a portion of it in the narrative 
of either writer, and believe that Cox's portrait or Swift's 
portrait is quite unlike the real Churchill. I take this as 
a single instance, prepared to be as sceptical about any 
other, and say to the Muse of History, " venerable 
daughter of Mnemosyne, I doubt every single statement 
you ever made since your ladyship was a Muse ! For 
all your grave airs and high pretensions, you are not a 
whit more trustworthy than some of your lighter sisters on 
whom your partizans look down. You bid me listen to a 
general's oration to his soldiers. Nonsense ! He no more 
made it than Turpin made his dying speech at Newgate. 
You pronounce a panegyric of a hero ; I doubt it, and say 
you flatter outrageously. You utter the condemnation of 
a loose character ; I doubt it, and think you are prejudiced 
and take the side of the Dons. You offer me an autobi- 
ography; I doubt all autobiographies I ever read, except 
those, perhaps, of Mr. Robinson Crusue, Mariner, and 
iWriters of his class. These have no object in setting them- 



94 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

selves right with the public or their own consciences, these 
have no motive for concealment or half truths, these call for 
no more confidence than I can cheerfully give, and do not 
force me to tax my credulity or to fortify it hy evidence. 
I take up a volume of Dr. Smollett, or a volume of the 
" Spectator," and say the fiction carries a greater amount 
of truth in solution than the volume which purports to he 
all true. Out of the fictitious hook I get the expression of 
the life of the time ; of the manners, of the movement, the 
dress, the pleasures, the laughter, the ridicules of society 
— the old times live again, and I travel in the old country 
of England. Can the heaviest historian do more for me ? 
As we read in these delightful volumes of the " Tatler" 
and " Spectator," the past age returns, the England of our 
ancestors is revivified. The May-pole rises in the Strand 
again in London ; the churches are crowded with daily 
worshippers ; the beaux are gathering in the coffee-houses 
— the gentry are going to the Drawing-room — the ladies 
are thronging to the toy-shops — the chairmen are jostling 
in the streets — the footmen are running with links before 
the chariots, or fighting round the theatre doors. In the 
country I see the young Squire riding to Eton with his 
servants behind him, and Will Wimble, the friend of the 
family, to see him safe. To make that journey from the 
Squire's and back. Will is a week on horseback. The 
coach takes five days between London and Bath. The 
judges and the bar ride the circuit. If my lady comes to 
town in her post-chariot, her people carry pistols to fire a 
salute on Captain Macheath if he should appear, and her 
couriers ride ahead to prepare apartments for her at the 
great caravanserais on the road ; Boniface receives her 



STEELE. 95 

under the creaking sign of the Bell or the Ram, and he 
and his chamberlains how her up the great stair to the 
state-apartments, whilst her carriage rumhles into the 
court-yard, where the Exeter Fly is housed that performs 
the journey in eight days, Grod willing, having achieved 
its daily flight of twenty miles, and landed its passengers 
for supper and sleep. The curate is taking his pipe in the 
kitchen, where the Captain's man — having hung up his 
master's half pike — is at his bacon and eggs, bragging of 
Ramillies and Malplaquet to the town's-folk, who have 
their club in the chimney-corner. The Captain is ogling 
the chambermaid in the wooden gallery, or bribing her to 
know who is the pretty young mistress that has come in 
the coach ? The pack-horses are in the great stable, and 
the drivers and ostlers carousing in the tap. And in Mrs. 
Landlady's bar, over a glass of strong waters, sits a gen- 
tleman of military appearance who travels with pistols, as 
all the rest of the world does, and has a rattling grey 
mare in the stables which will be saddled and away with 
its owner half-an-hour before the " Fly" sets out on its 
last day's flight. And some five miles on the road, as 
the Exeter Fly comes jingling and creaking onwards, it 
will suddenly be brought to a halt by a gentleman on a 
grey mare, with a black vizard on his face, who thrusts a 
long pistol into the coach-window, and bids the company to 

hand out their purses It must have been no small 

pleasure even to sit in the great kitchen in those days and 
see the tide of human kind pass by. We arrive at places 
now, but we travel no more. Addison talks jocularly of a 
difference of manner and costume being quite perceivable 
at Staines, where there passed a young fellow " with a 



96 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

very tolerable periwig," though to be sure his hat was out 
of fashion, and had a Ramillies cock. I would have liked to 
travel in those days (being of that class of travellers who 
are proverbially pretty easy coram latronibus) and have 
seen my friend with the grey mare and the black vizard. 
Alas ! there always came a day in the life of that warrior 
when it was the fashion to accompany him as he passed — 
without his black mask, and with a nosegay in his hand, 
accompanied by halberdiers and attended by the sheriff', — 
in a carriage without springs, and a clergyman jolting be- 
side him to a spot close by Cumberland-gate and the Mar- 
ble Arch, where a stone still records that here Tyburn 
turnpike stood. What a change in a century ; in a few 
years ! Within a few yards of that gate the fields began : 
the fields of his exploits, behind the hedges of which he 
lurked and robbed. A great and wealthy city has grown 
over those meadows. Were a man brought to die there 
now, the windows would be closed and the inhabitants 
keep their houses in sickening horror. A hundred years 
back, people crowded to see that last act of a highway- 
man's life, and make jokes on it. Swift laughed at him, 
grimly advising him to provide a Holland shirt and v^rhite 
cap crowned with a crimson or black ribbon for his exit, 
to mount the cart cheerfully — shake hands with the hang- 
man, and so — farewell. Gay wrote the most delightful 
ballads and made merry over the same hero. Contrast 
these with the writings of our present humourists ! Com- 
pare those morals and ours — those manners and ours ! 

We cannot tell — you would not bear to be told the 
whole truth regarding those men and manners. You 
could no more suffer in a British drawing-room, under the 



STEELE. 97 

reign of Queen Victoria, a fine gentleman or fine lady of 
Q,ueen Anne's time, or hear what they heard and said, 
than you would receive an ancient Briton. It is as one 
reads about savages, that one contemplates the wild ways, 
the barbarous feasts, the terrific pastimes, of the men of 
pleasure of that age. We have our fine gentlemen, and 
our " fast men ;" permit me to give you an idea of one 
particularly fast nobleman of Q,ueen Anne's days, whoso 
biography has been preserved to us by the law reporters. 

In 1691, when Steele was a boy at school, my Lord Mohun 
was tried by his peers for the murder of "William Mount- 
ford, comedian. In " Howell's State-Trials," the reader 
will find not only an edifying account of this exceedingly 
fast nobleman, but of the times and manners of those days. 
My lord's friend, a Captain Hill, smitten with the charms 
of the beautiful Mrs. Bracegirdle, and anxious to marry 
her at all hazards, determined to carry her off, and for this 
purpose hired a hackney-coach with six horses, and a half- 
dozen of soldiers, to aid him in the storm. The coach 
with a pair of horses (the four leaders being in waiting 
elsewhere) took its station opposite my Lord Craven's 
house in Drury-lane, by which door Mrs. Bracegirdle was 
to pass on her way from the theatre. As she passed in 
company of her mamma and a friend, Mr. Page, the Cap- 
tain seized her by the hand, the soldiers hustled Mr. Page 
and attacked him sword in hand, and Captain Hill and 
his noble friend endeavoured to force Madam Bracegirdle 
into the coach, Mr. Page called for help : the population 
of Drury-lane rose : it was impossible to effect the cap- 
ture; and bidding the soldiers go about their business, and 
the coach to drive off, Hill let go of his prey sulkily, and 



98 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

he waited for other opportunities of revenge. The man of 
whom he was most jealous was Will Mountford, the come- 
dian ; Will removed, he thought Mrs. Bracegirdle might 
be his : and accordingly the Captain and his lordship lay- 
that night in wait for Will, and as he was coming out of 
a house in Norfolk Street, while Mohun engaged him in 
talk, Hill, in the words of the Attorney-Greneral, made a 
pass and run him clean through the body. 

Sixty-one of my lord's peers finding him not guilty of 
murder, while but fourteen found him guilty, this very 
fast nobleman was discharged ; and made his appearance 
seven years after in another trial for murder — when he, 
my Lord Warwick, and three gentlemen of the military 
profession were concerned in the fight which ended in the 
death of Captain Coote. 

This jolly company were drinking together at Lockit's 
in Charing Cross, when angry words arose between Captain 
Coote and Captain French ; whom my Lord Mohun and 
my lord the Earl of Warwick' and Holland endeavoured to 
pacify. My lord Warwick was a dear friend of Captain 
Coote, lent him a hundred pound to buy his commission in 



* The husband of the lady Warwick, who married Addison, and the father of the 
young Earl, who was brought to his step-father's bed to see how a " Christian could 
die." He was amongst the wildest of the nobility of that day ; and in the curious 
collection of Chap-Books at the British Museum, I have seen more than one anec- 
dote of the freaks of the gay Lord. He was popular in London, as such daring 
spirits have been in our time. The anecdotists speak very kindly of his practical 
jokes. Mohun was scarcely out of prison for his second homicide, when he went 
on Lord Macclesfield's embassy to the elector of Hanover, when Queen Anne sent 
the garter to H. E. Highness. The chronicler of the expedition speaks of his lord- 
ship as an amiable young man, who had been in bad company, but was quite repent- 
ant and reformed. He and Macartney afterwards murdered the Duke of Hamilton 
between them, in which act Lord Mohun died. This amiable baron's name was 
Charles, and not Henry, as a recent novelist has christened him. 



STEELE. 99 

the Guards ; once when the captain was arrested for 13/, 
by his tailor, my lord lent him five guineas, often paid his 
reckoning for him, and showed him other offices of friend- 
ship. On this evening, the disputants, French and Coote, 
being separated whilst they were upstairs, unluckily stopped 
to drink ale again at the bar of Lookit's. The row began 
afresh — Coote lunged at French over the bar, and at last 
all six called for chairs, and went to Leicester-fields, where 
they fell to. Their lordships engaged on the side of Cap- 
tain Coote. My Lord of Warwick was severely wounded 
in the hand, Mr. French also was stabbed, but honest Cap- 
tain Coote got a couple of wounds — one especially, " a 
wound in the left side just under the short ribs, and pierc- 
ing through the diaphragma," which did for Captain Coote. 
Hence the trial of my Lords Warwick and Mohun : hence 
the assemblage of peers, the report of the transaction, in 
which these defunct fast men still live for the observation 
of the curious. My Lord of Warwick is brought to the bar 
by the Deputy G-overnor of the Tower of London, having 
the axe carried before him by the gentleman gaoler, who 
stood with it at the bar at the right hand of the prisoner, 
turning the edge from him ; the prisoner, at his approach, 
making three bows, one to his Grace the Lord High-Stew- 
ard, the other to the peers on each hand ; and his Grace 
and the peers return the salute. And besides these great 
personages, august in periwigs, and nodding to the right 
and left, a host of the small come up out of the past and pass 
before us — the jolly captains brawling in the tavern and 
laughing and cursing over their cups — the drawer that 
serves, the bar-girl that waits, the bailiff on the prowl, the 
chairmen trudging through the black lampless streets, and 



100 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

smoking their pipes by the railings, whilst swords are clash- 
ing in the garden within. "Help there! a gentleman is 
hurt :" the chairmen put up their pipes, and help the 
gentleman over the railings, and carry him, ghastly and 
bleeding, to the Bagnio in Long Acre, where they knock 
up the surgeon — a pretty tall gentleman — but that wound 
under the short ribs has done for him. Surgeon, lords, 
captains, bailiffs, chairmen, and gentleman gaoler with 
your axe, where be you now ? The gentleman axeman's 
head is off his own shoulders ; the lords and judges can 
wag theirs no longer ; the bailiff's writs have ceased to 
run ; the honest chairmen's pipes are put out, and with 
their brawny calves they have walked away into Hades — 
all as irrecoverably done for as Will Mountford or Captain 
Coote. The subject of our night's lecture saw all these 
people — ^rode in Captain Coote's company of the Guards 
very probably — wrote and sighed for Bracegirdle, went 
home tipsy in many a chair, after many a bottle, in many 
a tavern — fled from many a bailiff. 

In 1709, when the publication of the " Tatler" began, our 
great-great-grandfathers must have seized upon that new 
and delightful paper, with much such eagerness as lovers 
of light literature in a later day exhibited when the Wa- 
verley novels appeared, upon which the public rushed, for- 
saking that feeble entertainment of which the Miss Por- 
ters, the Anne of Swanseas, and worthy Mrs. Radcliffe her- 
self, with her dreary castles, and exploded old ghosts, had 
had pretty much the monopoly, I have looked over many 
of the comic books with which our ancestors amused them- 
selves, from the novels of Swift's coadjutrix, Mrs. Manley, 
the delectable author of the "New Atlantis," to the face- 



STEELE. 101 

tious productions of Tom Durfey and Tom Brown, and 
Ned Ward, writer of the "London Spy," and several other 
volumes of ribaldry. The slang of the taverns and ordina- 
ries, the wit of the Bagnios, form the strongest part of the 
farrago of which these libels are composed. In the excel- 
lent newspaper collection at the British Museum, you may 
see besides the " Craftsmen" and "Postboy" specimens, and 
queer specimens they are, of the higher literature of Queen 
Anne's time. Here is an abstract from a notable journal 
bearing date, Wednesday, October 13th, 1708, and entitled 
" The British Apollo ; or, curious amusements for the in- 
genious, by a society of gentlemen." The British Apollo 
invited and professed to answer questions upon all subjects 
of wit, morality, science, and even religion ; and two out 
of its four pages are filled with queries and replies much 
like some of the oracular penny-prints of the present time. 
One of the first querists, referring to the passage that a 
bishop should be the husband of one wife, argues that po- 
lygamy is justifiable in the laity. The society of gentle- 
men conducting the "British Apollo" are posed by this 
casuist, and promise to give him an answer. Celinda then 
wishes to know from " the gentlemen" concerning the 
souls of the dead, whether they shall have the satisfaction 
to know those whom they most valued in this transitory 
life. The gentlemen of the Apollo give but cold comfort to 
poor Celinda. They are inclined to think not : for say they, 
since every inhabitant of those regions will be infinitely 
dearer than here are our nearest relatives — what have we 
to do with a partial friendship in that happy place ? Poor 
Celinda ! it may have been a child or a lover whom she had 
lost, and was pining after, when the oracle of " British 



102 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Apollo" gave her this dismal answer. She has solved the 
question for herself by this time, and knows quite as well 
as the society of gentlemen. 

From theology we come to physic, and Q,. asks, " Why 
does hot water freeze sooner than cold ?" Apollo replies, 
" Hot water cannot be said to freeze sooner than cold, but 
water once heated and cold, may be subject to freeze by the 
evaporation of the spirituous parts of the water, which ren- 
ders it less able to withstand the power of frosty weather." 

The next query is rather a delicate one. " You, Mr. 
Apollo, who are said to be the G-od of wisdom, pray give 
us the reason why kissing is so much in fashion : what 
benefit one receives by it, and who was the inventor, and 
you will oblige Corinna." To this queer demand the lips 
of Phoebus, smiling, answer: "Pretty innocent Corinna! 
Apollo owns that he was a little surprised by your kissing 
question, particularly at that part of it where you desire 
to know the benefit you receive by it. Ah! madam, had 
you a lover, you would not come to Apollo for a solution ; 
since there is no dispute but the kisses of mutual lovers 
give infinite satisfaction. As to its invention it is certain 
nature was its author, and it began with the first court- 
ship." 

After a column more of questions, follow nearly two 
pages of poems, signed by Philander, Ardelia, and the like, 
and chiefly on the tender passion ; and the paper winds up 
with a letter from Leghorn, an account of the Duke of 
Marlborough and Prince Eugene before Lille, and proposals 
for publishing two sheets on the present state of ^.Ethiopia, 
by Mr. Hill ; all of which is printed for the authors by J. 
Mayo, at the Printing Press against Water Lane in Fleet 



STEELE. 103 

Street. What a change it must have been — how Apollo's 
oracles must have been struck dumb, when the " Tatler" 
appeared, and scholars, gentlemen, men of the world, men 
of genius, began to speak ! 

Shortly before the Boyne was fought, and young Swift 
had begun to make acquaintance with English court 
manners and English servitude, in Sir "William Temple's 
family, another Irish youth was brought to learn his hu- 
manities at the old school of Charterhouse, near Smith- 
field ; to which foundation he had been appointed by James 
Duke of Ormond, a governor of the House, and a patron 
of the lad's family. The boy was an orphan, and de- 
scribed, twenty years after, with a sweet pathos and sim- 
plicity, some of the earliest recollections of a life which 
was destined to be chequered by a strange variety of good 
and evil fortune. 

I am afraid no good report could be given by his mas- 
ters and ushers of that thick-set, square-faced, black-eyed, 
soft-hearted little Irish boy. He was very idle. He was 
whipped deservedly a great number of times. Though he 
had very good parts of his own, he got other boys to do his 
lessons for him, and only took just as much trouble as 
should enable him to scuffle through his exercises, and by 
good fortune escape the flogging block. One hundred and 
fifty years after, I have myself inspected, but only as an 
amateur, that instrument of righteous torture still existing, 
and in occasional use, in a secluded private apartment of 
the old Charterhouse School ; and have no doubt it is the 
very counterpart, if not the ancient and interesting ma- 
chine itself, at which poor Dick Steele submitted himself 
to the tormentors. 



104 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Besides being very kind, lazy, and good-natured, this 
boy went invariably into debt v^ith the tart-woman; ran 
out of bounds, and entered into pecuniary, or rather prom- 
issory engagements with the neighbouring lollipop-vendors 
and piemen — exhibited an early fondness and capacity for 
drinking mum and sack, and borrowed from all his com- 
rades who had money to lend. I have no sort of authority 
for the statements here made of Steele's early life ; but if 
the child is father of the man, the father of young Steele 
of Merton, who left Oxford without taking a degree and 
entered the Life Gruards — the father of Captain Steele of 
Lucas's Fusiliers, who got his company through the pat- 
ronage of my Lord Cutts — the father of Mr. Steele the 
commissioner of Stamps, the editor of the "Grazette," the 
" Tatler," and " Spectator," the expelled member of Parlia- 
ment, and the author of the " Tender Husband" and the 
" Conscious Lovers;" if man and boy resembled each 
other, Dick Steele the schoolboy must have been one of 
the most generous, good-for-nothing, amiable little crea- 
tures that ever conjugated the verb tupto I beat, tuptomai 
I am whipped, in any school in Great Britain. 

Almost every gentleman who does me the honour to 
hear me will remember that the very greatest character 
which he has seen in the course of his life, and the person 
to whom he has looked up with the greatest wonder and 
reverence, was the head boy at his school. The school- 
master himself hardly inspires such an awe. The head 
boy construes as well as the schoolmaster himself When 
he begins to speak the hall is hushed, and every little boy 
listens. He writes off copies of Latin verses as melodiously 
as Virgil. He is good-natured, and, his own master-pieco 



STEELE. 105 

achieved, pours out other copies of verses for other boys 
with an astonishing ease and fluency ; the idle ones only 
trembling lest they should be discovered on giving in their 
exercises, and whipped because their poems were too good. 
I have seen great men in my time, but never such a great 
one as that head boy of my childhood : we all thought he 
must be Prime Minister, and I was disappointed on meet- 
ing him in after life to find he was no more than six feet 
high. 

Dick Steele, the Charterhouse gownboy, contracted such 
an admiration in the years of his childhood, and retained it 
faithfully through his life. Through the school and through 
the world, whithersoever his strange fortune led this erring, 
wayward, affectionate creature, Joseph Addison was al- 
ways his head boy. Addison wrote his exercises. Addi- 
son did his best themes. He ran on Addison's messages : 
fagged for him and blacked his shoes : to be in Joe's com- 
pany was Dick's greatest pleasure ; and he took a sermon 
or a caning from his monitor with the most boundless rev- 
erence, acquiescence, and affection.' 

Steele found Addison a stately college Don at Oxford 
and himself did not make much figure at this place. H. ^ 
wrote a comedy, which, by the advice of a friend, the 
humble fellow burned there ; and some verses which I 
dare say are as sublime as other gentlemen's compositions 
at that age ; but being smitten with a sudden love fo 



' " Steele had the greatest veneration for Addison, and used to show it, in al 
companies, in a particular manner. Addison, now and then, used to play a little 
upon them ; but he always took it well." — Pope (Spence's Anecdotes). 

" Sir Richard Steele was the best-natured creature in the world : even in his 
worst state of health, he seemed to desire nothing but to please and be pleased."-;- 
Dr. Young {Spence''s Anecdotes.) ' 

K 2 



106 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

military glory, he threw up the cap and gown for the sad- 
dle and bridle, and rode privately in the Horse Guards, in 
the Duke of Ormond's troop — the second — and, probably, 
with the rest of the gentlemen of his troop, " all mounted 
on black horses with white feathers in their hats, and scar- 
let coats richly laced ;" marched by King William, in Hyde 
Park, in November, 1699, and a great show of the nobili- 
ty, besides twenty thousand people, and above a thousand 
coaches. " The Guards had just got their new cloathes," 
the "London Post" said: "they are extraordinary grand, 
and thought to be the finist body of horse in the world." 
But Steele could hardly have seen any actual service. 
He who wrote about himself, his mother, his wife, his 
loves, his debts, his friends, and the wine he drank, would 
have told us of his battles if he had seen any. His old 
patron, Ormond, probably got him his cornetcy in the 
Guards, from which he was promoted to be a captain in 
Lucas's Fusiliers, getting his company through the patron- 
age of Lord Cutts, whose secretary he was, and to whom 
he dedicated his work called the " Christian Hero." As 
poor Dick, whilst writing this ardent devotional work, was 
deep in debt, in drink, and in all the follies of the town ; 
it is related that all the officers of Lucas's, and the gentle- 
men of the Guards laughed at Dick.' And in truth a 



' The gaiety of his dramatic tone may be seen in this little scene between two 
brilliant sisters, from his comedy, The Funeral, or Grief a la Mode. Dick wrote 
this, he said, from " a necessity of enlivening his character," which it seemed, the 
" Christian Hero" had a tendency to make too decorous, grave, and respectable, in 
the eyes of readers of that pious piece. 

["iScewe draws, and discovers Lady Charlotte, reading at a table, — Lady Har- 
riet, playing at a glass, to and fro, and viewing herself.'^ 

" L. Ha. — Nay, good sister, you may as well talk to me [looking at herself as she 
speaksl as sit staring at a book which I know you can't attend. — Good Dr. Lucas 



STEELE. 107 



theologian in liquor is not a respectable object, and a her- 
mit though he may be out at elbows must not be in debt 

may have writ there what he pleases, but there's no putting Francis, Lord Hardy, 
now Earl of Brumpton, out of your head, or making him absent from your eyes. Do 
but look on me, now, and deny it if you can. 

"Z(. Ch. — You are the maddest girl [smilingl. 

"L. Ha. — Look ye, I knew you could not say it and forbear laughing — llooking 
over Charlotte]. — Oh ! I see his name as plain as you do — F — r — a — n, Fran, — c — 
i — s, Francis, 'tis in every line of the book. 

"L. Ch. — ^^Rising.l It's in vain, I see, to mind anything in such impertinent 
company — but granting t'were as you say, as to my Lord Hardy — t'is more excus- 
able to admire another, than oneself. 

"L. Ha. — No, I think not — yes, I grant you, than really to be vain of one's per- 
son, but I don't admire myself — Pish ! I don't believe my eyes to have that soft- 
ness. [Looking in the glass.] They an't so piercing : no t'is only stuff, the men 
will be talking. — Some people are such admirers of teeth — Lord, what signifies 
teeth ! (Showing her teeth). A very black-a-moor has as white a set of teeth as I 
— No, sister, I don't admire myself, but I've a spirit of contradiction in me : I dont 
know I'm in love with myself, only to rival the men. 

"i. Ch. — Ay, but Mr. Campley will gain ground ev'n of that rival of his, your 
dear self. 

"L. Ha. — Oh, what have I done to you, that you should name that insolent in- 
truder ? A confident opinionative fop. — No indeed, if I am, as a poetical lover of 
mine sighed and sung, of both sexes, 

The public envy and the public care, 
I shan't be so easily catched — I thank him — I want but to be sure, I should heartily 
torment him by banishing him, and then consider whether he should depart this life 
or not. 

"L. Ch. — Indeed, sister, to be serious with you, this vanity in your humour does 
not at all become you. 

"i. Ha. — Vanity ! All the matter is, we gay people are more sincere than you 
wise folks : all your life's an art. — Speak you real. — Look you there. — [Hauling 
her to the glass.] Are you not struck with a secret pleasure when you view that 
bloom in your look, that harmony in your shape, that promptitude in your mien ? 

"L. Ch. — Well, simpleton, if I am at first so simple as to be a little taken with 
myself, I know it a fault, and take pains to correct it. 

"L. Ha. — Pshaw ! Pshaw ! Talk this musty tale to old Mrs. Fardingale, 'tis 
tiresome for me to think at that rate. 

"-L. Ch. — They that think it too soon to understand themselves will very soon 
find it too late. — But tell me honestly, don't you like Campley ? 

"L. Ha. — The fellow is not to be abhorred, if the forward thing did not think of 



108 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

to the tailor. Steele says of himself that he was always 
sinning and repenting. He beat his breast and cried most 
piteously when he did repent : but as soon as crying had 
made him thirsty, he fell to sinning again. In that charm- 
ing paper in the " Tatler," in which he records his father's 
death, his mother's griefs, his own most solemn and tender 
emotions, he says he is interrupted by the arrival of a 
hamper of wine, "the same as is to be sold at Garraway's, 
next week," upon the receipt of which he sends for three 
friends, and they fall to instantly, " drinking two bottles 
a-piece, with great benefit to themselves, and not separa- 
ting till two o'clock in the morning." 

His life was so. Jack the drawer was always interrupt- 
ing it, bringing him a bottle from the "Rose," or inviting 
him over to a bout there with Sir Plume and Mr. Diver ; 
and Dick wiped his eyes, which were whimpering over his 
papers, took down his laced hat, put on his sword and wig, 
kissed his wife and children, told them a lie about pressing 
business, and went off to the "Rose" to the jolly fellows. 

While Mr. Addison was abroad, and after he came home 
in rather a dismal way to wait upon Providence in his 
shabby lodging in the Haymarket, young Captain Steele 
was cutting a much smarter figure than that of his clas- 
sical friend of Charterhouse Cloister, and Maudlin Walk. 
Could not some painter give an interview between the 
gallant captain of Lucas's, with his hat cocked, and his 



getting me so easily. — Oh I hate a heart I can't break when I please. — What makes 
the value of dear china, but that 'tis so brittle ? — were it not for that, you might as 
well have stone mugs in your closet. — The Funeral, Oct. 2nd. 

" We knew the obligations the stage had to his writings [Steele's] ; there being 
scarcely a comedian of merit in our whole company whom his " Tatlers" had not 
made better by his recommendation of them." — Cibber. 



STEELE. 109 

lace, and his face too, a trifle tarnished with drink, and 
that poet, that philosopher, pale, proud, and poor, his friend 
and monitor of school days, of all days ? How Dick must 
have hragged about his chances and his hopes, and the fine 
company he kept, and the charms of the reigning toasts 
and popular actresses, and the number of bottles that he 
and my lord and some other pretty fellows had cracked 
over night at the " Devil," or the " Grarter !" Cannot one 
fancy Joseph Addison's calm smile and cold grey eyes fol- 
lowing Dick for an instant, as he struts down the Mall, to 
dine with the Guard, at St. James's, before he turns, with 
his sober pace and thread-bare suit, to walk back to his 
lodgings up the two pair of stairs ? Steele's name was 
down for promotion, Dick always said himself, in the 
glorious, pious, and immortal William's last table-book. 
Jonathan Swift's name had been written there by the same 
hand too. 

Our worthy friend, the author of the " Christian Hero," 
continued to make no small figure about town by the use 
of his wits.* He was appointed G-azetteer : he wrote, in 
1703, " The Tender Husband," his second play, in which 
there is some delightful farcical writing, and of which he 
fondly owned in after-life, and when Addison was no more, 
that there were " many applauded strokes" from Addison's 
beloved hand." Is it not a pleasant partnership to remem- 



^ " There is not now in his sight that excellent man whom Heaven made his 
friend and superior to be at a certain place in pain for what he should say or do. 
I will go on in his further encouragement. The best woman that ever man had 
cannot now lament and pine at his neglect of himself" — Steele [of himself]. 
The Theatre. No. 12, Feb. 1719-20. 

^ " The Funeral" supplies an admirable stroke of humour, — one which Sydney 
Smith has used as an illustration of the faculty in his Lectures. 



no ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ber ? Cannot one fancy Steele, full of spirits and youth, 
leaving his gay company to go to Addison's lodging, where 
his friend sits in the shabby sitting-room, quite serene, and 
cheerful, and poor? In 1704 Steele came on the town 
with another comedy, and behold, it was so moral and 
religious, as poor Dick insisted, so dull the town thought, 
that the " Lying Lover" was damned. 

Addison's hour of success now came, and he was able to 
help our friend, the " Christian Hero," in such a way, that, 
if there had been any chance of keeping that poor tipsy 
champion upon his legs, his fortune was safe, and his com- 
petence assured. Steele procured the place of Commis- 
sioner of Stamps : he wrote so richly, so gracefully often, 
so kindly always, with such a pleasant wit and easy 
frankness, with such a gush of good spirits and good hu- 
mour, that his early papers may be compared to Addison's 
own, and are to be read, by a male reader at least, with 
quite an equal pleasure.' 



The undertaker is talking to his employes about their duty. 

Sable. — " Ha, you ! — A little more upon the dismal [formhig their countenances'] ; 
this fellow has a good mortal look, — place him near the corpse : that wainscot-face 
must be o' top of the stairs ; that fellow's almost in a fright (that looks as if he were 
full of some strange misery) at the end of the hall. So — But I'll fix you all myself. 
Let's have no laughing now on any provocation. Look yonder, — that hale, well- 
looking puppy ! You ungrateful scoundrel, did not I pity you, take you out of a 
great man's service, and show you the pleasure of receiving wages ? Did not I 
give you ten, then fifteen and twenty shillings a week to be sorrowful ! — and the more 
I give you, I think the gladder you are .'" 

' " From my own Apartment, Nov. 16. 

" There are several persons who have many pleasures and entertainments in 
their possession, which they do not enjoy ; it is, therefore, a kind and good office to 
acquaint them with their own happiness, and turn their attention to such instances 
of their good fortune as they are apt to overlook. Persons in the married state 
often want such a monitor , and pine away their days by looking upon the same 



STEELE, 111 

After the " Tatler," in 1711, the famous " Spectator" 
made its appearance, and this was followed, at various in- 



conaition in anguish and murmuring which carries with it, in the opinion of oth- 
ers, a complication of all the pleasures of life, and a retreat from its inquietudes. 

" I am led into this thought by a visit I made to an old friend who was formerly 
my school-fellow. He came to town last week, with his family, for the winter ; 
and yesterday morning sent me word his wife expected me to dinner. I am, as it 
were, at home at that house, and every member of it knows me for their well- 
wisher. I cannot, indeed, express the pleasure it is to be met by the children with 
so much joy as I am when I go thither. The boys and girls strive who shall come 
first, when they think it is I that am knocking at the door ; and that child which 
loses the race to me runs back again to tell the father it is Mr. BickerstafF. This 
day I was led in by a pretty girl that we all thought must have forgot me ; for the 
family has been out of town these two years. Her knowing me again was a mighty 
subject with us, and took up our discourse at the first entrance ; after which, they 
begun to rally me upon a thousand little stories they heard in the country, about 
my marriage to one of my neighbours' daughters ; upon which, the gentleman, my 
friend, said, ' Nay, if Mr. Bickerstaff marries a child of any of his old companions, 
I hope mine shall have the preference : there is Mrs. Mary is now sixteen, and would 
make him as fine a widow as the best of them. But I know him too well ; he is 
so enamoured with the very memory of those who flourished in our youth, that he 
will not so much as look upon the modem beauties. I remember, old gentleman, 
how often you went home in a day to refresh your countenance and dress when 
Teraminta reigned in your heart. As we came up in the coach, I repeated to my 
wife some of your verses on her.' With such reflections on little passages which 
happened long ago, we passed our time during a cheerful and elegant meal. After 
dinner his lady left the room, as did also the children. As soon as we were alone, 
he took me by the hand : ' Well, my good friend,' says he, ' I am heartily glad to 
see thee ; 1 was afraid you would never have seen all the company that dined with 
you to-day again. Do not you think the good woman of the house a little altered 
since you followed her from the playhouse to find out who she was for me ?' 1 
perceived a tear fall down his cheek as he spoke, which moved me not a little. 
But, to turn the discourse, I said, ' She is not, indeed, that creature she was when 
she returned me the letter I carried from you, and told me, " She hoped, as I was 
a gentleman, I would be employed no more to trouble her, who had never offended 
me ; but would be so much the gentleman's friend as to dissuade him from a pur- 
suit which he could never succeed in." You may remember I thought her in 
earnest, and you were forced to employ your cousin Will, who made his sister get 
acquainted with her for you. You cannot expect her to be for ever fifteen.' ' Fif- 
teen !' replied my good friend. ' Ah ! you little understand — you, that have lived 
a bachelor — how great, how exquisite a pleasure there is in being really beloved ! 



112 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

tervals, by many periodicals under the same editor — the 
" Guardian" — the "Englishman" — the "Lover," whose 



It is impossible that the most beauteous face in nature should raise in me such 
pleasing ideas as when I look upon that excellent woman. That fading in her 
countenance is chiefly caused by her watching with me in my fever. This was 
followed by a fit of sickness, which had like to have carried me off last winter. I 
tell you, sincerely, I have so many obligations to her that I cannot, with any sort of 
moderation, think of her present state of health. But, as to what you say of fifteen, 
she gives me every day pleasure beyond what I ever knew in the possession of her 
beauty when I was in the vigour of youth. Every moment of her life brings me 
fresh instances of her complacency to my inclinations, and her prudence in regard 
to my fortune. Her face is to me much more beautiful than when I first saw it ; 
there is no decay in any feature which I cannot trace from the very instant it was 
occasioned by some anxious concern for my welfare and interests. Thus, at the 
same time, methinks, the love I conceived towards her for what she was, is height- 
ened by my gratitude for what she is. The love of a wife is as much above the 
idle passion commonly called by that name, as the loud laughter of buffoons is in- 
ferior to the elegant mirth of gentlemen. Oh ! she is an inestimable jewel ! In 
her examination of her household affairs, she shows a certain fearfulness to find a 
fault, which makes her servants obey her like children ; and the meanest we have 
has an ingenuous shame for an offence not always to be seen in children in other 
families. I speak freely to you, my old friend ; ever since her sickness, things that 
gave me the quickest joy before turn now to a certain anxiety. As the children 
play in the next room, I know the poor things by their steps, and am considering 
what they must do should they lose their mother in their tender years. The pleas- 
ure I used to take in telling my boy stories of battles, and asking my girl questions 
about the disposal of her baby, and the gossipping of it, is turned into inward re- 
flection and melancholy.' 

" He would have gone on in this tender way, when the good lady entered, and, 
with an inexpressible sweetness in her countenance, told us 'she had been search- 
ing her closet for something very good, to treat such an old friend as I was.' Her 
husband's eyes sparkled with pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance ; and 
I saw all his fears vanish in an instant. The lady observing something in our looks 
which showed we had been more serious than ordinary, and seeing her husband 
receive her with great concern under a forced cheerfulness, immediately guessed at 
what he had been talking of; and applying herself to me, said, with a smile, ' Mr. 
Bickerstaff, do not believe a word of what he tells you ; I shall still live to have 
you for my second, as I have often promised you, unless he takes more caie of 
himself than he has done since his coming to town. You must know he tells me, 
that he finds London is a much more healthy place than the country ; for he sees 
several of his old acquaintances and schoolfellows, arc here — young fellows with 



STEELE. 113 

love was rather insipid — the " Reader," of whom the pub- 
lic saw no more after his second appearance — the " Thea- 
tre," under the pseudonym of Sir John Edgar, which 
Steele wrote, while Grovernor of the Royal Company of 
Comedians, to which post, and to that of Surveyor of the 
Royal Stables at Hampton Court, and to the Commission 

fair, full-bottomed periwigs. I could scarce keep him this morning from going out 
open-breasted.' My friend, who is always extremely delighted with her agreeable 
humour, made her sit down with us. She did it with that easiness which is pecul- 
iar to women of sense ; and to keep up the good humour she had brought in with 
her, turned her raillery upon me. ' Mr. BickerstafF, you remember you followed me 
one night from the playhouse ; suppose you should carry me thither to-morrow 
night, and lead me in the front box.' This put us into a long field of discourse 
about the beauties who were the mothers to the present, and shined in the boxes 
twenty years ago. I told her, ' I was glad she had transferred so many of her 
charms, and I did not question but her eldest daughter was within half-a-year of 
being a toast.' 

" We were pleasing ourselves with this fantastical preferment of the young lady 
when, on a sudden, we were alarmed with the noise of a drum, and immediately 
entered my little godson to give me a point of war. His mother, between laughing 
and chiding, would have put him out of the room ; but I would not part with him 
so. I found, upon conversation with him, though he was a little noisy in his mirth, 
that the child had excellent parts, and was a great master of all the learning on the 
other side of eight years old. I perceived him a very great historian in ' iEsop's 
Fables ;' but he frankly declared to me his mind, ' that he did not delight in that 
learning, because he did not believe they were true ;' for which reason I found he 
had very much turned his studies, for about a twelvemonth past, into the lives of 
Don Bellianis of Greece, Guy of Warwick, ' the Seven Champions,' and other his- 
torians of that age. I could not but observe the satisfaction the father took in the 
forwardness of his son, and that these diversions might turn to some profit. I 
found the boy had made remarks, which might be of service to him during the 
course of his whole life. He would tell you the mismanagement of John Hicker- 
thrift, find fault with the passionate temper in Bevis of Southampton, and loved St. 
George for being the champion of England ; and by this means had his thoughts in- 
sensibly moulded into the notions of discretion, virtue, and honour. I was extolling 
his accomplishments when his mother told me, ' that the little girl who led me in 
this morning was, in her way, a better scholar than he. Betty,' said she, ' deals 
chiefly in fairies and sprights ; and sometimes in a winter night will terrify the 
maids with her accounts, until they are afraid to go up to bed.' 

" I sat with them until it was very late, sometimes in merry, sometimes in seri- 



114 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

of the Peace for Middlesex, and to the honour of knight- 
hood, Steele had been preferred soon after the accession 
of G-eorge I., whose cause honest Dick had nohly fought, 
through disgrace and danger, against the most formidable 
enemies, against traitors and bullies, against Bolingbroke 
and Swift, in the last reign. With the arrival of the King, 
that splendid conspiracy broke up ; and a golden opportu- 
nity came to Dick Steele, whose hand, alas, was too care- 
less to gripe it. 

Steele married twice ; and outlived his places, his 
schemes, his wife, his income, his health, and almost 
everything but his kind heart. That ceased to trouble 
him in 1729, when he died, worn out and almost for- 
gotten by his contemporaries in Wales, where he had the 
remnant of a property. 

Posterity has been kinder to this amiable creature ; all 
women especially are bound to be grateful to Steele, as he 
was the first of our writers who really seemed to admire 
and respect them. Congreve the G-reat, who alludes to the 
low estimation in which women were held in Elizabeth's 
time, as a reason why the women of Shakspeare make so 
small a figure in the poet's dialogues, though he can him- 
self pay splendid compliments to women, yet looks on them 
as mere instruments of gallantry, and destined, like the 
most consummate fortifications, to fall, after a certain 



ous discourse, with this particular pleasure, which gives the only true relish to all 
conversation, a sense that every one of us liked each other. I went home, consid- 
ering the different conditions of a married life and that of a bachelor : and I must 
confess it struck me with a secret concern, to reflect, that whenever I go off I shall 
leave no traces behind me. In this pensive mood I return to my family ; that is to 
say, to my maid, my dog, my cat, who only can be the better or worse for what 
happens to me." — The Tatler. 



STEELE. 115 

time, before the arts and bravery of the besieger, man. 
There is a letter of Swift's, entitled "Advice to a very 
Young Married liady," which shows the Dean's opinion 
of the female society of his day, and that if he despised 
man he utterly scorned women too. No lady of our time 
could be treated by any man, were he ever so much a wit 
or Dean, in such a tone of insolent patronage and vulgar 
protection. In this performance. Swift hardly takes pains 
to hide his opinion that a woman is a fool : tells her to read 
books, as if reading was a novel accomplishment ; and in- 
forms her that " not one gentleman's daughter in a thou- 
sand has been brought to read or understand her own nat- 
ural tongue." Addison laughs at women equally ; but, 
with the gentleness and politeness of his nature, smiles at 
them and watches them, as if they were harmless, half- 
witted, amusing, pretty creatures, only made to be men's 
playthings. It was Steele who first began to pay a manly 
homage to their goodness and understanding, as well as to 
their tenderness and beauty.' In his comedies, the heroes 
do not rant and rave about the divine beauties of G-loriana 
or Statira, as the characters were made to do in the chiv- 
alry romances and the high-flown dramas just going out of 



* "As to the pursuits after affection and esteem, the fair sex are happy in this 
particular, that with them the one is much more nearly related to the other than in 
men. The love of a woman is inseparable from some esteem of her ; and as she 
is naturally the object of affection, the woman who has your esteem has also some 
degree of your love. A man that dotes on a woman for her beauty, will whisper 
his friend, ' that creature has a great deal of wit when you are well acquainted with 
her.' And if you examine the bottom of your esteem for a woman, you will find 
you have a greater opinion of her beauty than anybody else. As to us men, I de- 
sign to pass most of my time with the facetious Harry Bickerstaff , but William 
Bickerstaff, the most prudent man of our family, shall be my executor." — Tatler, 
No. 206. 



116 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

vogue, but Steele admires women's virtue, acknowledges 
their sense, and adores their purity and beauty, with an 
ardour and strength which should win the good will of all 
women to their hearty and respectful champion. It is this 
ardour, this respect, this manliness, which makes his com- 
edies so pleasant and their heroes such fine gentlemen. 
He paid the finest compliment to a woman that perhaps 
ever was offered. Of one woman, whom Congreve had also 
admired and celebrated, Steele says, that " to have loved 
her was a liberal education." " How often," he says, ded- 
icating a volume to his wife, "how often has your ten- 
derness removed pain from my sick head, how often an- 
guish from my afflicted heart ! If there are such beings 
as guardian angels, they are thus employed. I cannot be- 
lieve one of them to be more good in inclination, or more 
charming in form than my wife." His breast seems to 
warm and his eyes to kindle when he meets with a good 
and beautiful woman, and it is with his heart as well as 
with his hat that he salutes her. About children, and all 
that relates to home, he is not less tender, and more than 
once speaks in apology of what he calls his softness. He 
would have been nothing without that delightful weak- 
ness. It is that which gives his works their worth and his 
style its charm. It, like his life, is full of faults and care- 
less blunders ; and redeemed, like that, by his sweet and 
compassionate nature. 

We possess of poor Steele's wild and chequered life some 
of the most curious memoranda that ever were left of a 
man's biography.' Most men's letters, from Cicero down 

' The Correspondence of Steele passed after his death into the possession of his 
daughter Elizabeth, by his second wife, Miss Scurlock, of Carmarthenshire. She 



STEELE. 117 



to "Walpole, or down to the great men of our own time, if 
you will, are doctored compositions, and written with an 



married the Hon. John, afterwards third Lord Trevor. At her death, part of the 
letters passed to Mr. Thomas, a grandson of a natural daughter of Steele's ; and 
part to Lady Trevor's next of kin, Mr. Scurloek. — They were published by the 
learned Nichols — from whose later edition of them, in 1809, our specimens are 
quoted. 
Here we have him, in his courtship — which was not a very long one. 

TO MRS. SCURLOCK. 

"Aug. 30, 1707. 
" Madam, — 

" I beg pardon that my paper is not finer, but I am forced to write from a 
coiFee-house, where I am attending about business. There is a dirty crowd of busy 
faces all around me, talking of money ; while all my ambition, all my wealth is 
love ! Love which animates my heart, sweetens my humour, enlarges my soul, and 
affects every action of my life. It is to my lovely charmer I owe, that many noble 
ideas are continually affixed to my words and actions ; it is the natural effect of 
that generous passion to create in the admirer some similitude of the object ad- 
mired. Thus, my dear, am I every day to improve from so sweet a companion. 
Look up, my fair one, to that Heaven which made thee such ; and join with me to 
implore its influence on our tender innocent hours, and beseech the author of love 
to bless the rites he has ordained — and mingle with our happiness a just sense of 
our transient condition, and a resignation to His will, which only can regulate our 
minds to a steady endeavour to please Him and each other. 
" I am for ever your faithful servant, 

" Rich. Steele." 

Some few hours afterwards, apparently, Mistress Scurloek received the next one 
— obviously written later in the day ! 

"Saturday night {Aug. 30, 1707). 
" Dear, Lovely Mrs. Scurlock, — 

" I have been in very good company, where your health, under the character 
of the woman I loved best, has been often drunk ; so that I may say that I am dead 
drunk for your sake, which is more than / die for you. 

" Rich. Steele." 

to mrs. scurlock. 

"Sept. 1, 1707. 
" Madam, — 

" It is the hardest thing in the world to be in love, and yet attend business. 
As for me, all who speak to me find me out, and I must lock myself up, or other peo- 
ple will do it for me. 

"A gentleman asked me this morning, 'what news from Lisbon?' and I an- 



118 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

eye suspicious towards posterity. That dedication of 
Steele's to his wife is an artificial performance, possibly ; 

swered, ' she is exquisitelj' handsome.' Another desired to know ' when I had last 
been at Hampton Court V I replied, ' it will be on Tuesday come se'nnight.' Pry'- 
thee allow me at least to kis? your hand before that day, that my mind may be in 
some composure. Oh Love ! 

" A thousand torments dwell about thee, 
Yet who could Uve, to live without thee ?" 
" Methinks I could write a volume to you ; but all the language on earth would 
fail in saying how much, and with what disinterested passion, 

" I am ever yours, 

" Rich. Steele." 

Two days after this, he is found expounding his circumstances and prospects to 
the young lady's mamma. He dates from " Lord Sunderland's office, Whitehall ;" 
and states his clear income at 1025/. per annum. " I promise myself," says he, " the 
pleasure of an industrious and virtuous life, in studying to do things agreeable to 
you." 

They were married, according to the most probable conjectures, about the 7th 
inst. There are traces of a tiff about the middle of the next month ; she being 
prudish and fidgetty, as he was impassioned and reckless. General progress, how- 
ever, may be seen from the following notes. The " house in Bury -street, St. 
James's," was now taken. 

TO MRS. STEELE. 

" Oct. 16, 1707. 
"Dearest Being on Earth, — 

" Pardon me if you do not see me till eleven o'clock, having met a school- 
fellow from India, by whom I am to be informed on things this night which ex- 
pressly concerns your obedient husband, 

"Rich. Steele." 

to mrs. steele. 

" Eight 0^ clock, Fountain Tavern, Oct. 22, 1707. 
" My Dear, — 

" I beg of you not to be uneasy ; for I have done a great deal of business to- 
day very successfully, and wait an hour or two about my ' Gazette.' " 

''Dec. 22, 1707. 
"My dear, dear Wife, — 

"I write to let you know I do not come homo to dinner, being obliged to at- 
tend some business abroad, of which I shall give you an account (when I see you 
in the evening), as becomes your dutiful and obedient husband." 

" Devil Tavern, Temple-bar, Jan. 3, 1707-8, 
" Dear Prue, — 

" I have partly succeeded in my business to-day, and inclose two guineas as 



STEELE. 119 

at least, it is written with that degree of artifice which an 
orator uses in arranging a statement for the House, or a 
poet employs in preparing a sentiment in verse or for the 
stage. But there are some 400 letters of Dick Steele's to 

earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home to dinner. I languish for your 
welfare and will never be a moment careless more. 

" Your faithful husband," &c. 

"Jan. 14, 1707-8. 
" Dear Wife, — 

" Mr. Edgecomb, Ned Ask, and Mr. Lumley have desired me to sit an hour 

with them at the George, in Pall-mall, for which I desire your patience till twelve 

o'clock, and that you will go to bed," &c. 

" Gray's-inn, Feb. 3, 1708. 
" Dear Prue, — 

" If the man who has my shoemaker's bill calls, let him be answered that I 
shall call on him as I come home. I stay here in order to get Jonson to discount a 
bill for me, and shall dine with him for that end. He is expected at home every 

minute. 

" Your most humble obedient servant," &c. 

" Tennis-court Coffee-house, May 5, 1708. 

" Dear Wife, — 

" I hope I have done this day what will be pleasing to you ; in the meantime 
shall lie this night at a baker's, one Leg, over against the Devil Tavern, at Charing- 
cross. I shall be able to confront the fools who wish me uneasy, and shall have 
the satisfaction to see thee cheerful and at ease. 

" If the printer's boy be at home, send him hither ; and let Mrs. Todd send by the 
boy my night-gown, slippers, and clean linen. You shall hear from me early in the 
morning," &c. 

Dozens of similar letters follow, with occasional guineas, little parcels of tea, or 
walnuts, &c. In 1709 the " Tatler" made its appearance. The following curious 
note dates April 7th, 1710 : — 

" I inclose to you [' Dear Prue'] a receipt for the saucepan and spoon, and a note 
of 231. of Lewis's, which will make up the 501. 1 promised for your ensuing occasion. 

" I know no happiness in this life in any degree comparable to the pleasure I 
have in your person and society. I only beg of you to add to your other charms a 
fearfulness to see a man that loves you in pain and uneasiness, to make me as hap- 
py as it is possible to be in this life. Rising a little in a morning, and bemg dis- 
posed to a cheerfulness .... would not be amiss." 

In another, he is found excusing his coming home, being " invited to supper to 
Mr. Boyle's." " Dear Prue," he says on this occasion, " do not send after me, for 
I shall be ridiculous." 



120 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

his wife, which that thrifty woman preserved accurately, 
and which could have been written but for her and her 
alone. They contain details of the business, pleasures, quar- 
rels, reconciliations of the pair ; they have all the genuine- 
ness of conversation ; they are as artless as a child's prat- 
tle, and as confidential as a curtain-lecture. Some are 
written from the printing-office, where he is waiting for the 
proof sheets of his "Gazette," or his " Tatler ;" some are 
written from the tavern, whence he promises to come to 
his wife "within a pint of wine," and where he has given 
a rendezvous to a friend, or a money-lender : some are com- 
posed in a high state of vinous excitement, when his head 
is flustered with Burgundy, and his heart abounds with 
amorous warmth for his darling Prue : some are under the 
influence of the dismal headache and repentance next morn- 
ing : some, alas, are from the lock-up house, where the 
lawyers have impounded him, and where he is waiting for 
bail. You trace many years of the poor fellow's career in 
these letters. In September, 1707, from which day she 
began to save the letters, he married the beautiful Mistress 
Scurlock. You have his passionate protestations to the 
lady ; his respectful proposals to her mamma ; his private 
prayer to Heaven when the union so ardently desired was 
completed ; his fond professions of contrition and promises 
of amendment, when, immediately after his marriage, there 
began to be just cause for the one and need for the other. 
Captain Steele took a house for his lady upon their mar- 
riage, "the third door from Grermain-street, left hand of 
Bury-street," and the next year he presented his wife with 
a country house at Hampton. It appears she had a char- 
iot and pair, and sometimes four horses: he himself en- 



STEELE. 121 

joyed a little horse for his own riding. He paid, or prom- 
ised to pay, his barber fifty pounds a year, and always went 
abroad in a laced coat and a large black-buckled periwig, 
that must have cost somebody fifty guineas. He was 
rather a well-to-do gentleman. Captain Steele, with the 
proceeds of his estates in Barbadoes (left to him by his first 
wife), his income as writer of the " Gazette," and his office 
of gentleman waiter to his Royal Highness Prince Greorge. 
His second wife brought him a fortune too. But it is mel- 
ancholy to relate that with these houses and chariots and 
horses and income, the Captain was constantly in want of 
money, for which his beloved bride was asking as con- 
stantly. In the course of a few pages we begin to find the 
shoemaker calling for money, and some directions from the 
Captain, who has not thirty pounds to spare. He sends his 
wife, "the beautifuUest object in the world," as he calls 
her, and evidently in reply to applications of her own, 
which have gone the way of all waste paper, and lighted 
Dick's pipes, which were smoked a hundred and forty 
years ago — he sends his wife now a guinea, then a half- 
guinea, then a couple of guineas, then half a pound of tea ; 
and again no money and no tea at all, but a promise that 
his darling Prue shall have some in a day or two ; or a re- 
quest, p^haps, that she will send over his night-gown and 
shaving-plate to the temporary lodging where the nomadic 
captain is lying, hidden from the bailiffs. Oh that a Chris- 
tian hero and late captain in Lucas's should be afraid of a 
dirty sheriff's officer ! That the pink and pride of chival- 
ry should turn pale before a writ ! It stands to record in 
poor Dick's own handwriting ; the queer collection is pre- 
served at the British Museum to this present day ; that the 

F 



128 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

rent of the nuptial house in Jermyn-street, sacred to unut- 
terable tenderness and Prue, and three doors from Bury- 
street, was not paid until after the landlord had put in an 
execution on Captain Steele's furniture. Addison sold the 
house and furniture at Hampton, and, after deducting the 
sum in which his incorrigible friend was indebted to him, 
handed over the residue of the proceeds of the sale to poor 
Dick, who was not in the least angry at Addison's sum- 
mary proceeding, and I dare say was very glad of any sale 
or execution, the result of which was to give him a little 
ready money. Having a small house in Jermyn-street for 
which he could not pay, and a country house at Hampton 
on which he had borrowed money, nothing must content 
Captain Dick but the taking, in 1712, a much finer, larger, 
and grander house, in Bloomsbury-square ; where his un- 
happy landlord got no better satisfaction than his friend in 
St. James's, and where it is recorded that Dick, giving a 
grand entertainment, had a half-dozen queer-looking fel- 
lows in livery to wait upon his noble guests, and confessed 
that his servants were bailiffs to a man. "I fared like a 
distressed prince," the kindly prodigal writes, generously 
complimenting Addison for his assistance in the " Tatler," 
— " I fared like a distressed prince, who calls in a power- 
ful neighbour to his aid. I was undone by my auxiliary ; 
when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without 
dependence on him." Poor, needy Prince of Bloomsbury ! 
think of him in his palace, with his allies from Chancery- 
lane ominously guarding him. 

All sorts of stories are told indicative of his recklessness 
and his good humour. One narrated by Dr. Hoadly is ex- 
ceedingly characteristic ; it shows the life of the time : and 



STEELE. 123 

our poor friend very weak, but very kind both in and out 
of his cups. 

" My father," (says Dr. John Hoadly, the Bishop's son) 
— " when Bishop of Bangor, was, by invitation, present at 
one of the Whig meetings, held at the Trumpet, in Shoe 
Lane, when Sir Richard, in his zeal, rather exposed him- 
self, having the double duty of the day upon him, as well 
to celebrate the immortal memory of King William, it be- 
ing the 4th November, as to drink his friend Addison up 
to conversation-pitch, whose phlegmatic constitution was 
hardly warmed for society by that time. Steele was not 
fit for it. Two remarkable circumstances happened. John 
Sly, the hatter of facetious memory, was in the house ; and 
John, pretty mellow, took it into his head to come into the 
company on his knees, with a tankard of ale in his hand 
to drink oft' to the immortal memory, and to return in the 
same manner. Steele sitting next my father, whispered 
him — Do laugh. It is humanity to laugh. Sir Richard, 
in the evening, being too much in the same condition, was 
put into a chair, and sent home. Nothing would serve 
him but being carried to the Bishop of Bangor's, late as it 
was. However, the chairmen carried him home, and got 
him up stairs, when his great complaisance would wait on 
them down stairs, which he did, and then was got quietly 
to bed." ' 

There is another amusing story which I believe that 
renowned collector, Mr. Joseph Miller, or his successors, 
have incorporated into their work. Sir Richard Steele, at 



* Of this famous Bishop, Steele wrote, — 

" Virtue with so much ease on Bangor sits. 
All faults he pardons, though he none commits." 



124 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

a time when he was much occupied with theatrical af- 
fairs, built himself a pretty private theatre, and, before it 
was opened to his friends and guests, was anxious to try 
whether the hall was well adapted for hearing. Accord- 
ingly he placed himself in the most remote part of the 
gallery, and begged the carpenter who had built the house 
to speak up from the stage. The man at first said that he 
was unaccustomed to public speaking, and did not know 
what to say to his honour ; but the good-natured knight 
called out to him to say whatever was uppermost ; and 
after a moment the carpenter began, in a voice perfectly 
audible: "Sir Richard Steele I" he said, " for three months 
past me and my men has been a working in this theatre, 
and we've never seen the colour of your honour's money : 
we will be very much obliged if you'll pay it directly, for 
until you do we won't drive in another nail." Sir Richard 
said that his friend's elocution was perfect, but that he 
didn't like his subject much. 

The great charm of Steele's writing is its naturalness. 
He wrote so quickly and carelessly, that he was forced to 
make the reader his confidant, and had not the time to 
deceive him. He had a small share of book-learning, but 
a vast acquaintance with the world. He had known men 
and taverns. He had lived with gownsmen, with troopers, 
with gentlemen ushers of the Court, with men and women 
of fashion ; with authors and wits, with the inmates of 
the spunging houses, and with the frequenters of all the 
clubs and coffee houses in the town. He was liked in all 
company because he liked it ; and you like to see his en- 
joyment as you like to see the glee of a box full of chil- 
dren at the pantomime. He was not one of those lonely 



STEELE. 125 

ones of the earth whose greatness obliged them to be soli- 
tary ; on the contrary, he admired, I think, more than any 
man who ever wrote ; and full of hearty applause and 
sympathy, wins upon you by calling you to share his de- 
light and good humour. His laugh rings through the whole 
house. He must have been invaluable at a tragedy, and 
have cried as much as the most tender young lady in the 
boxes. He has a relish for beauty and goodness wherever 
he meets it. He admired Shakspeare affectionately, and 
more than any man of his time ; and, according to his 
generous expansive nature, called upon all his company to 
like what he liked himself. He did not damn with faint 
praise : he was in the world and of it ; and his enjoyment 
of life presents the strangest contrast to Swift's savage in- 
dignation, and Addison's lonely serenity.^ Permit me to 

* Here we have some of his later letters : — 

TO LADY STEELE. 

" Hampton Court, March, 16, 1716-17. 
" Dear Peue, 

" If you have written anything to me which 1 should have received last 

night, I beg your pardon that I cannot answer till the next post Your son 

at the present writing is mighty well employed in tumbling on the floor of the room 

and sweeping the sand with a feather. He grows a most delightful child, and very 

full of play and spirit. He is also a very great scholar : he can read his Primer : 

and I have brought down my Virgil. He makes most shrewd remarks about the 

pictures. We are very intimate friends and playfellows. He begins to be very 

ragged ; and I hope I shall be pardoned if I equip him with new clothes and frocks, 

or what Mrs. Evans and I shall think for his service." 

TO LADY STEELE. 

[Undated.] 
" You tell me you want a little flattery from me. I assure you I know no one 
who deserves so much commendation as yourself, and to whom saying the best 
things would be so little like flattery. The thing speaks itself, considering you as 
a very handsome woman that loves retirement — one who does not want wit, and 
yet is extremely sincere ; and so I could go through all the vices which attend the 
good qualities of other people, of which you are exempt. But, indeed, though you 
have every perfection, you have an extravagant fault, which almost frustrates tho 



126 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



read to you a passage from each writer, curiously indica- 
tive of his peculiar humour : the subject is the same, and 
the mood the very gravest. We have said that upon all 
the actions of man, the most trifling and the most solemn, 
the humourist takes upon himself to comment. All read- 
ers of our old masters know the terrible lines of Swift, in 
which he hints at his philosophy and describes the end of 
mankind :' — 

" Amazed, confused, its fate unknown, 
The world stood trembling at Jove's throne ; 
While each pale sinner hung his head, 
Jove, nodding, shook the heavens and said : 

' Offending race of human kind. 
By nature, reason, learning blind ; 
You who through frailty stepped aside, 
And you who never err'd through pride ; 



good in you to me ; and that is, that you do not love to dress, to appear, to shine 
out, even at my request, and to make me proud of you, or rather to indulge the 

pride I have that you are mine 

" Your most affectionate, obsequious husband, 

" Rich. Steele. 
" A quarter of Molly's schooling is paid. The children are perfectly well." 

TO LADY STEELE. 

" March 26, 1717. 

" My dearest Prue, 

" I have received your's, wherein you give me the sensible affliction of tell- 
ing me enow of the continual pain in your head When I lay in your place, 

and on your pillow, I assure you I fell into tears last night, to think that my charm- 
ing little insolent might be then awake and in pain ; and look it to be a sin to go 
to sleep. 

" For this tender passion towards you, I must be contented that your Prueship 
will condescend to call yourself my well-wisher " 

At the time when the above later letters were written. Lady Steele was in 
Wales, looking after her estate there. Steele, about this time, was much occupied 
with a project for conveying fish alive, by which, as he constantly assures his wife, 
he firmly believed he should make his fortune. It did not succeed, however. 

Lady Steele died in December of the succeeding year. She lies buried in 
Westminster Abbey. 

' Lord Chesterfield sends these verses to Voltaire in a characteristic letter. 



STEELE. 127 

You who in different sects were shamm'd, 
And come to see each other damn'd ; 
(So some folk told you, but they knew 
No more of Jove's designs than you.) 
The world's mad business now is o'er, 
And I resent your freaks no more ; 
/ to such blockheads set my wit, 
I damn such fools — go, go, you're bit ?' " 

Addison, speaking on the very same theme, but with 
how different a voice, says, in his famous paper on "West- 
minster Abbey ("Spectator," No. 26): — "For my own 
part, though I am always serious, I do not know what it 
is to be melancholy, and can therefore take a view of na- 
ture in her deep and solemn scenes with the same pleasure 
as in her most gay and delightful ones. When I look upon 
the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies within 
me ; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every in- 
ordinate desire goes out ; when I meet with the grief of 
parents on a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion ; 
when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider 
the vanity of grieving for those we must quickly follow." 
(I have owned that I do not think Addison's heart melted 
very much, or that he indulged very inordinately in the 
" vanity of grieving.") " When," he goes on, " when I see 
kings lying by those who deposed them : when I consider 
rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided 
the world with their contests and disputes, — I reflect with 
sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions, 
and debates of mankind. And, when I read the several 
dates on the tombs of some that died yesterday and some 
600 years ago, I consider that Great Day when we shall 
all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance to- 
gether." 



128 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Our third humourist comes to speak upon the same sub- 
ject. You will have observed in the previous extracts the 
characteristic humour of each writer — the subject and the 
contrast — the fact of Death, and the play of individual 
thought, by which each comments on it, and now hear the 
third writer — death, sorrow, and the grave, being for the 
moment also his theme. " The first sense of sorrow I ever 
knew," Steele says in the " Tatler," " was upon the death 
of my father, at which time I was not quite five years of 
age : but was rather amazed at what all the house meant, 
than possessed of a real understanding why nobody would 
play with us. I remember I went into the room where 
his body lay, and my mother sate weeping alone by it. I 
had my battledore in my hand, and fell a beating the cof- 
fin, and calling papa ; for, I know not how, I had some idea 
that he was locked up there. My mother caught me in 
her arms, and, transported beyond all patience of the silent 
grief she was before in, she almost smothered me in her 
embraces, and told me in a flood of tears, ' Papa could not 
hear me, and would play with me no more : for they were 
going to put him under ground, whence he would never 
come to us again.' She was a very beautiful woman, of 
a noble spirit, and there was a dignity in her grief amidst 
all the wildness of her transport, which methought struck 
me with an instinct of sorrow that, before I was sensible 
what it was to grieve, seized my very soul, and has made 
pity the weakness of my heart ever since." 

Can there be three more characteristic moods of minds 
and men? " Fools, do you know anything of this myste- 
ry?" says Swift, stamping on a grave and carrying his 
scorn for mankind actually beyond it. Miserable, purblind 



STEELE. 129 

wretches, how dare you to pretend to comprehend the In- 
scrutable, and how can your dim eyes pierce the unfath- 
omable depths of yonder boundless heaven ? Addison, in 
a much kinder language and gentler voice, utters much 
the same sentiment : and speaks of the rivalry of wits, and 
the contests of holy men, with the same sceptic placidity, 
" Look what a little vain dust we are ;" he says, smiling 
over the tombstones, and catching, as is his wont, quite a 
divine effulgence as he looks heavenward, he speaks in 
words of inspiration almost, of " the Great Day, when we 
shall all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance 
together." 

The third, whose theme is Death, too, and who will speak 
his word of moral as Heaven teaches him, leads you up to 
his father's coffin, and shows you his beautiful mother 
weeping, and himself an unconscious little boy wondering 
at her side. His own natural tears flow, as he takes your 
hand and confidingly asks your sympathy. *' See how good 
and innocent and beautiful women are," he says, " how 
tender little children I" Let us love these and one anoth- 
er, brother — G-od knows we have need of love and pardon. 
So it is each man looks with his own eyes, speaks with his 
own voice, and prays his own prayer. 

When Steele asks your sympathy for the actors in that 
charming scene of Love and Grief and Death, who can re- 
fuse it ? One yields to it as to the frank advance of a child, 
or to the appeal of a woman. A man is seldom more manly 
than when he is what you call unmanned — the source of 
his emotion is championship, pity, and courage ; the in- 
stinctive desire to cherish those who are innocent and un- 
happy, and defend those who are tender and weak. If 

F 2 



130 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Steele is not our friend he is nothing. He is by no means 
the most brilliant of wits nor the deepest of thinkers : but 
he is our friend : we love him, as children love their love 
with an A. because he is amiable. Who likes a man best 
because he is the cleverest or the wisest of mankind ; or a 
woman because she is the most virtuous, or talks French ; 
or plays the piano better than the rest of her sex ? I own 
to liking Dick Steele the man, and Dick Steele the author, 
much better than much better men and much better au- 
thors. 

The misfortune regarding Steele is, that most part of the 
company here present must take his amiability upon hear- 
say, and certainly cannot make his intimate acquaintance. 
Not that Steele was worse than his time ; on the contrary, 
a far better, truer, and higher-hearted man than most who 
lived in it. But things were done in that society, and 
names were named, which would make you shudder now. 
What would be the sensation of a polite youth of the pres- 
ent day, if at a ball he saw the young object of his affec- 
tions taking a box out of her pocket and a pinch of snuff : 
or if at dinner, by the charmer's side, she deliberately put 
her knife into her mouth ? If she cut her mother's throat 
with it mamma would scarcely be less shocked. I allude 
to these peculiarities of by-gone times as an excuse for my 
favourite, Steele, who was not worse, and often much more 
delicate than his neighbours. 

There exists a curious document descriptive of the man- 
ners of the last age, which describe most minutely the 
amusements and occupations of persons of fashion in Lon- 
don at the time of which we are speaking ; the time of 
Swift, and Addison, and Steele. 



STEELE. 131 

When Lord Sparkish, Tom Neverout, and Colonel Alwit, 
the immortal personages of Swift's polite conversation, came 
to breakfast with my Lady Smart, at eleven o'clock in the 
morning, my Lord Smart was absent at the levee. His 
lordship was at home to dinner at three o'clock to receive 
his guests ; and we may sit down to this meal, like the 
Barmecides, and see the fops of the last century before us. 
Seven of them sate down at dinner, and were joined by a 
country baronet, who told them they kept court hours. 
These persons of fashion began their dinner with a sirloin 
of beef, fish, a shoulder of veal, and a tongue. My Lady 
Smart carved the sirloin, my Lady Answerall helped the 
fish, and the gallant Colonel cut the shoulder of veal. All 
made a considerable inroad on the sirloin and the shoulder 
of veal with the exception of Sir John, who had no appetite, 
having already partaken of a beefsteak and two mugs of 
ale, besides a tankard of March beer as soon as he got out 
of bed. They drank claret, which the master of the house 
said should always be drunk after fish ; and my Lord Smart 
particularly recommended some excellent cider to my Lord 
Sparkish, which occasioned some brilliant remarks from 
that nobleman. When the host called for wine, he nodded 
to one or other of his guests, and said, " Tom Neverout, 
my service to you." 

After the first course came almond pudding, and fritters, 
which the Colonel took with his hands out of the dish, in 
order to help the brilliant Miss Notable ; chickens, black 
puddings, and soup ; and Lady Smart, the elegant mistress 
of the mansion, finding a skewer in a dish, placed it in her 
plate with directions that it should be carried down to the 
cook and dressed for the cook's own dinner. Wine and 



182 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

small beer were drunk during this second course ; and 
when the Colonel called for beer, he called the butler, 
Friend, and asked whether the beer was good. Various 
jocular remarks passed from the gentlefolks to the serv- 
ants ; at breakfast several persons had a word and a joke 
for Mrs. Betty, my lady's maid, who warmed the cream 
and had charge of the canister (the tea cost thirty shillings 
a pound in those days). When my Lady Sparkish sent 
her footman out to my Lady Match to come at six o'clock 
and play at quadrille, her ladyship warned the man to fol- 
low his nose, and if he fell by the way not to stay to get 
up again. And when the gentlemen asked the hall-porter 
if his lady was at home, that functionary replied, with man- 
ly waggishness, " She was at home just now, but she's not 
gone out yet." 

After the puddings, sweet and black, the fritters and 
soup, came the third course, of which the chief dish was 
a hot venison pasty, which was put before Lord Smart, and 
carved by that nobleman. Besides the pasty, there was a 
hare, a rabbit, some pigeons, partridges, a goose, and a ham. 
Beer and wine were freely imbibed during this course, 
the gentlemen always pledging somebody with every glass 
which they drank ; and by this time the conversation be- 
tween Tom Neverout and Miss Notable had grown so brisk 
and lively, that the Derbyshire baronet began to think the 
young gentlewoman was Tom's sweetheart ; on which Miss 
remarked, that she loved Tom " like pie." After the goose, 
some of the gentlemen took a dram of brandy, which " was 
very good for the wholesomes," Sir John said ; and now 
having had a tolerably substantial dinner, honest Lord 
Smart bade the butler bring up the great tankard full of 



STEELE. 133 

October to Sir John. The great tankard was passed from 
hand to hand and mouth to mouth, but when pressed by 
the noble host upon the gallant Tom Neverout, he said, 
" No faith, my lord, I like your wine, and won't put a 
churl upon a gentleman. Your honour's claret is good 
enough for me." And so, the dinner over, the host said, 
" Hang saving, bring us up a ha'porth of cheese." 

The cloth was now taken away, and a bottle of Burgun- 
dy was set down, of which the ladies were invited to par- 
take before they went to their tea. When they withdrew 
the gentlemen promised to join them in an hour ; fresh 
bottles were brought, the " dead men," meaning the empty 
bottles, removed ; and " d'you hear, John ? bring clean 
glasses," my Lord Smart said. On which the gallant Col- 
onel Alwit said, " I'll keep my glass ; for wine is the best 
liquor to wash glasses in." 

After an hour the gentlemen joined the ladies, and there 
they all sate and played quadrille until three o'clock in the 
morning, when the chairs and the flambeaux came, and 
this noble company went to bed. 

Such were manners six or seven score years ago. I draw 
no inference from this queer picture — let all moralists here 
present deduce their own. Fancy the moral condition of 
that society in which a lady of fashion joked with a foot- 
man, and carved a great shoulder of veal, and provided 
besides a sirloin, a goose, hare, rabbit, chickens, partridges, 
black-puddings, and a ham for a dinner for eight Christians. 
What — what could have been the condition of that polite 
world in which people openly ate goose after almond pud- 
ding, and took their soup in the middle of dinner ? Fancy 
a colonel in the G-uards putting his hand into a dish of 



134 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

beignet d^abricot, and helping his neighbour, a young lady 
du TMtnde I Fancy a noble lord calling out to the servants, 
before the ladies at his table, "Hang expense, bring us a 
ha'porth of cheese !" Such were the ladies of Saint James's 
— such were the frequenters of "White's Chocolate House, 
when Swift used to visit it, and Steele described it as the 
centre of pleasure, gallantry, and entertainment, a hundred 
and forty years ago ! 

Dennis, who ran a muck at the literary society of his 
day, falls foul of poor Steele, and thus depicts him, — "Sir 
John Edgar, of the County of in Ireland is of a mid- 
dle stature, broad shoulders, thick legs, a shape like the 
picture of somebody over a farmer's chimney — a short 
chin, a short nose, a short forehead, a broad flat face, and 
a dusky countenance. Yet with such a face and such a 
shape, he discovered at sixty that he took himself for a 
beauty, and appeared to be more mortified at being told 
that he was ugly, than he was by any reflection made 
upon his honour or understanding. 

" He is a gentleman born, witness himself, of very hon- 
ourable family ; certainly of a very ancient one, for his 
ancestors flourished in Tipperary long before the English 
ever set foot in Ireland. He has testimony of this more 
authentic than the Heralds' Office, or any human testi- 
mony. For God has marked him more abundantly than 
he did Cain, and stamped his native country on his face, 
his understanding, his writings, his actions, his passions, 
and above all his vanity. The Hibernian brogue is still 
upon all these, though long habit and length of days have 
worn it off" his tongue."* 

' Steele replied to Dennis in an " Answer to a Whimsical Pamphlet, called the 



STEELE. 135 

Although this portrait is the work of a man who was 
neither the friend of Steele, nor of any other man alive ; 
yet there is a dreadful resemhlance to the original, in the 
savage and exaggerated traits of the caricature, and every 
body who knows him must recognise Dick Steele. Dick set 
about almost all the undertakings of his life with inade- 
quate means, and, as he took and furnished a house with 
the most generous intentions towards his friends, the most 
tender gallantry towards his wife, and with this only draw- 
Character of Sir John Edgar." What Steele had to say against the cross-grained 
old Critic discovers a great deal of humour: 

" Thou never did'st let the sun into thy garret, for fear he should bring a bailiff 
along with him 

" Your years are about sixty-five, an ugly vinegar face, that if you had any com- 
mand you vs^ould be obeyed out of fear, from your ill-nature pictured there ; not from 
any other motive. Your height is about some five feet five inches. You see I can 
give your exact measure as well as if I had taken your dimension with a good cud- 
gel, which I promise you to do as soon as ever I have the good fortune to meet 
you 

"Your doughty paunch stands before you like a firkin of butter, and your duck- 
legs seem to be cast for carrying burdens. 

"Thy works are libels upon others, and satires upon thyself; and while they 
bark at men of sense call him knave and fool that wrote them. Thou hast a great 
antipathy to thy own species ; and hatest the sight of a fool, but in thy glass." 

Steele had been kind to Dennis, and once got arrested on account of a pecuniary 
service which he did him. When John heard of the fact — " S'death !" cries John ; 
" why did not he keep out of the way as I did ?" 

The " Answer" concludes by mentioning that Gibber had offered Ten Pounds for 
the discovery of the authorship of Dennis's pamphlet ; on which, says Steele — 

" I am only sorry he has offered so much, because the twentieth part would have 
over-valued his whole carcase. But I know the fellow that he keeps to give an- 
swers to his creditors will betray him ; for he gave me his word to bring officers on 
the top of the house that should make a hole through the ceiling of his garret, and 
so bring him to the punishment he deserves. Some people think this expedient out 
of the way, and that he would make his escape upon hearing the least noise. I say 
so too ; but it takes him up half an hour every night to fortify himself with his old 
hair trunk, two or three joint stools, and some other lumber, which he ties togethei 
with cords so fast that it takes him up the same time in the morning to release him- 
self." 



136 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

back, that he had not wherewithal to pay the rent when 
Q,uarter-day came, — so, in his life he proposed to himself 
the most magnificent schemes of virtue, forbearance, pub- 
lic and private good, and the advancement of his own and 
the national religion ; but when he had to pay for these 
articles — so difficult to purchase and so costly to maintain 
— poor Dick's money was not forthcoming : and when Vir- 
tue called with her little bill, Dick made a shuffling excuse 
that he could not see her that morning, having a headache 
from being tipsy over night ; or when stern Duty rapped 
at the door with his account, Dick was absent and not 
ready to pay. He was shirking at the tavern ; or had some 
particular business (of somebody's else) at the ordinary; or 
he was in hiding, or worse than in hiding, in the lock-up 
house. What a situation for a man ! — for a philanthropist 
— for a lover of right and truth — for a magnificent designer 
and schemer ! Not to dare to look in the face the Religion 
which he adored and which he had offended : to have to 
shirk down back lanes and alleys, so as to avoid the friend 
whom he loved and who had trusted him — to have the 
house which he had intended for his wife, whom he loved 
passionately, and for her ladyship's company which ho 
wished to entertain splendidly, in the possession of a bailiff's 
man, with a crowd of little creditors, — grocers, butchers, 
and small-coal men, lingering round the door with their 
bills and jeering at him. Alas ! for poor Dick Steele ! 
For nobody else of course. There is no man or woman in 
our time who makes fine projects and gives them up from 
idleness or want of means. When Duty calls upon ws, we 
no doubt are always at home and ready to pay that grim 
tax-gatherer. When we are stricken with remorse and 



STEELE. 137 

promise reform, we keep our promise, and are never angry, 
or idle, or extravagant any more. There are no chambers 
in our hearts, destined for family friends and affections, 
and now occupied by some Sin's emissary and bailiff in 
possession. There are no little sins, shabby peccadilloes, 
importunate remembrances, or disappointed holders of our 
promises to reform, hovering at our steps, or knocking at 
our door ! Of course not. We are living in the nineteenth 
century, and Poor Dick Steele stumbled and got up again, 
and got into jail and out again, and sinned and repented ; 
and loved and suffered ; and lived and died scores of years 
ago. Peace be with him ! Let us think gently of one 
who was so gentle : let us speak kindly of one whose own 
breast exuberated with human kindness. 



LECTURE THE FOURTH. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 

Matthew Prior was one of those famous and lucky 
wits of the auspicious reign of Queen Anne, whose name 
it behoves us not to pass over. Mat was a world-philoso- 
pher of no small genius, good-nature, and acumen.* He 

^ Gay calls him — " Dear Prior .... beloved by every muse." — Mr. Pope's 
Welcome from Greece. 

Swift and Prior were very intimate, and he is frequently mentioned in the 
" Journal to Stella." " Mr. Prior," says Swift, " walks to make himself fat, and I 
to keep myself down We often walk round the park together." 

In Swift's works there is a curious tract called " Remarks on the Characters of 
the Court of Queen Anne" [Scott's edition, vol. xii.] The " Remarks" are not by 
the Dean ; but at the end of each is an addition in italics from his hand, and these 
are always characteristic. Thus, to the Duke of Marlborough, he adds, " Detestably 
Covetous," &,c. Prior is thus noticed — 

"Matthew Prior, Esq., Commissioner of Trade. 

" On the Queen's accession to the throne, he was continued in his office ; is very 
well at court with the ministry, and is an entire creature of my Lord Jersey's, 
whom he sup[)orts by his advice ; is one of the best poets in England, but very fac- 
tious in conversation. A thin, hollow-looked man, turned of 40 years old. This is 
near the truth." 

" Yet counting as far as to fifty his years. 

His virtues and vices were as other men's are, 
High hopes he conceived and he smothered great fears, 

In a life party-coloured — half pleasure, half care. 
Not to business a drudge, nor to faction a slave, 

He strove to make interest and freedom agree ; 
In public employments industrious and grave, 

And alone with his friends, Lord, how meriy was he ! 

Now in equipage stately, now humbly on foot. 
Both fortunes he tried, but to neither would trust ; 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 139 

loved, he drank, he sang. He describes himself, in one of 
his lyrics, " in a little Dutch chaise on a Saturday night ; 
on his left hand his Horace, and a friend on his right," 
going out of town from the Hague to pass that evening and 
the ensuing Sunday, boozing at a Spiel-haus with his com- 
panions, perhaps bobbing for perch in a Dutch canal, and 
noting down, in a strain and with a grace not unworthy of 
his Epicurean master, the charms of his idleness, his re- 
treat, and his Batavian Chloe. A vintner's son in White- 
hall, and a distinguished pupil of Busby of the Rod, Prior 
attracted some notice by writing verses at St. John's Col- 
lege, Cambridge, and, coming up to town, aided Montague' 
in an attack on the noble old English lion John Dryden, 
in ridicule of whose work, " The Hind and the Panther," he 
brought out that remarkable and famous burlesque, " The 
Town and Country Mouse." Are not you all acquainted 
with it ? Have you not all got it by heart ? What ! 
have you never heard of it ? See what fame is made of ! 
The wonderful part of the satire was, that, as a natural 
consequence of " The Town and Country Mouse," Mat- 
thew Prior was made Secretary of Embassy at the Hague ! 
I believe it is dancing, rather than singing, which distin- 
guishes the young English diplomatists of the present day ; 
and have seen them in various parts perform that part of 



And whirled in the round as the wheel turned about, 

He found riches had wings, and knew man was but dust." 

Prior's Poems. [For my own monument.] 
1 " They joined to produce a parody, entitled the ' Town and Country Mouse," 
part of which Mr. Bayes is supposed to gratify his old friends Smart and Johnson, 
by repeating to them. The piece is therefore founded upon the twice-told jest of 
the ' Rehearsal.' . . . There is nothing new or original in the idea. ... In this 
piece, Prior, though the younger man, seems to have had by far the largest share." 
— Scott's Dryden, vol. i. p. 330. 



140 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

their duty very finely. In Prior's time it appears a dif- 
ferent accomplishment led to preferment. Could you 
write a copy of Alcaics ? that was the question. Could 
you turn out a neat epigram or two ? Could you compose 
" The Town and Country Mouse ?" It is manifest that, 
hy the possession of this faculty, the most difficult treaties, 
the laws of foreign nations, and the interests of our own, 
are easily understood. Prior rose in the diplomatic serv- 
ice, and said good things that proved his sense and his 
spirit. When the apartments at Versailles were shown to 
him, with the victories of Louis XIV. painted on the walls, 
and Prior was asked whether the palace of the king of 
England had any such decorations, " The monuments of my 
master's actions," Mat said, of William, whom he cordially 
revered, " are to be, seen everywhere except in his own 
house." Bravo, Mat ! Prior rose to be full ambassador at 
Paris,' where he somehow was cheated out of his ambas- 
sadorial plate ; and in a heroic poem, addressed by him to 
her late lamented majesty Q,ueen Anne, Mat makes some 
magnificent allusions to these dishes and spoons, of which 
Fate had deprived him. All that he wants, he says, is her 
Majesty's picture ; without that he cannot he happy. 

" Thee, gracious Anne, thee present I adore : 
Thee, Queen of Peace, if Time and Fate have power 

' " He was to have been in the same commission with the Duke of Shrewsbury, 

but that that nobleman," says Johnson, " refused to be associated with one so 

meanly born. Prior therefore continued to act without a title till the Duke's return 

next year to England, and then he assumed the style and dignity of ambassador." 

He had been thinking of slights of this sort when he wrote his Epitaph : — 

" Nobles and heralds by your leave, 

Here lies what once was Matthew Prior, 
The son of Adam and of Eve ; 

Can Bourbon or Nassau claim higher ?" 
But, in this case, the old prejudice got the better of the old joke. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 141 

Higher to raise the glories of thy reign, 

In words sublimer and a nobler strain. 

May future bards the mighty theme rehearse, 

Here, Stator .Jove, and Phoebus, king of Verse, 

The votive tablet I suspend." 

"With that word the poem stops abruptly. The votive 
tablet is suspended for ever like Mahomet's coffin. News 
came that the Q,ueen was dead. Stator Jove, and Phoebus, 
king of verse, were left there, hovering to this day, over 
the votive tablet. The picture was never got any more than 
the spoons and dishes — the inspiration ceased — the verses 
were not wanted — the ambassador was not wanted. Poor 
Mat was re-called from his embassy, suffered disgrace along 
with his patrons, lived under a sort of cloud ever after, and 
disappeared in Essex, When deprived of all his pensions 
and emoluments, the hearty and generous Oxford pen- 
sioned him. They played for gallant stakes — the bold 
men of those days — and lived and gave splendidly. 

Johnson quotes from Spence a legend, that Prior, after 
spending an evening with Harley, St. John, Pope, and 
Swift, would go off and smoke a pipe with a couple of 
friends of his, a soldier and his wife, in Long Acre. Those 
who have not read his late excellency's poems should be 
warned that they smack not a little of the conversation of 
his Long Acre friends. Johnson speaks slightingly of his 
lyrics ; but with due deference to the great Samuel, Prior's 
seem to me amongst the easiest, the richest, the most 
charmingly humourous of English lyrical poems.* Horace 



' His epigrams have the genuine sparkle : 

The Remedy worse than the Disease. 

"I sent for Radcliff; was so ill, 

That other doctors gave me over ; 



142 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

is always in his mind, and his song, and his philosophy, 
his good sense, his happy easy turns and melody, his loves, 
and his epicureanism, bear a great resemblance to that 
most delightful and accomplished master. In reading his 
works, one is struck with their modern air, as well as by 
their happy similarity to the songs of the charming owner 
of the Sabine farm. In his verses addressed to Halifax, 
he says, writing of that endless theme to poets, the vanity 
of human wishes — 

" So when in fevered dreams we sink, 
And, waking, taste what we desire, 
The real draught but feeds the fire, 
The dream is better than the drink. 
" Our hopes like towering falcons aim 
At objects in an airy height : 
To stand aloof and view the flight, 
Is all the pleasure of the game." 



He felt my pulse, prescribed a pill, 
And I was likely to recover. 

' But when the wit began to wheeze, 
And wine had warmed the politician, 
Cured yesterday of my disease, 
I died last night of my physician." 



" Yes, every poet is a fool ; 

By demonstration Ned can show it ; 
Happy could Ned's inverted rule 
Prove every fool to be a poet." 



' On his death-bed poor Lubin lies, 

His spouse is in despair ; 
With frequent sobs and mutual sighs. 
They both express their care. 

' A different cause, says Parson Sly, 
The same effect may give ; 
Poor Lubin fears that he shall die, 
His wife that he may live." 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 143 

Would not you fancy that a poet of our own days was 
singing ? and, in the verses of Chloe weeping and reproach- 
ing him for his inconstancy, where he says — 

" The God of us verse-men, you know, child, the Sun, 
How after his journey, he set up his rest. 
If at morning o'er earth 'tis his fancy to run, 
At night he declines on his Thetis's breast. 
" So, when I am wearied with wandering all day. 
To thee, my delight, in the evening I come : 
No matter what beauties I saw in my way ; 

They were but my visits, but thou art my home ! 
" Then finish, dear Cloe, this pastoral war. 
And let us like Horace and Lydia agree ; 
For thou art a girl as much brighter than her, 
As he was a poet sublimer than me." 

If Prior read Horace, did not Thomas Moore study Prior ? 
Love and Pleasure find singers in all days. Roses are al- 
ways blowing and fading — to-day as in that pretty time 
when Prior sang of them, and of Chloe lamenting their de- 
cay— 

" She sighed, she smiled, and to the flowers 
Pointing, the lovely moralist said ; 
See, friend, in some few leisure hours. 
See yonder what a change is made ! 
" Ah, me ! the blooming pride of May, 
And that of Beauty are but one : 
At mom both flourished bright and gay, 
Both fade at evening, pale and gone. 

" At dawn poor Stella danced and sung, 
The amorous youth around her bowed, 
At night her fatal knell was rung ; 
I saw, and kissed her in her shroud. 

" Such as she is who died to-day, 
Such I, alas, may be to-morrow : 
Go, Damon, bid the Muse display 
The justice of thy Cloe's sorrow." 

Damon's knell was rung in 1721. May his turf lie 



144 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

lightly on him ! Deus sit propitius huic potatori^ as Wal- 
ter de Mapes sang.' Perhaps Samuel Johnson, who spoke 



' PRIOR TO SIR THOMAS HANMER. 

" Aug. 4, 1709. 

" Dear Sir, 

" Friendship may live, I grant you, without being fed and cherished by cor- 
respondence ; but with that additional benefit I am of opinion it will look more 
cheerful and thrive better : for in this case, as in love, though a man is sure of his 
own constancy, yet his happiness depends a good deal upon the sentiments of an- 
other, and while you and Chloe are alive, 'tis not enough that I love you both ex- 
cept I am sure you both love me again ; and as one of her scrawls fortifies my mind 
more against affliction than all Epictetus, with Simplicius's comments into the bar- 
gain, so your single letter gave me more real pleasure than all the works of Plato. 

I must return my answer to your very kind question concerning my health. 

The Bath waters have done a good deal towards the recovery of it, and the great 
specific, Cape Caballum, will, I think, confirm it. Upon this head I must tell you 
that my mare Betty grows blind, and may one day, by breaking my neck, perfect 
my cure : if at Rixham fair any pretty nagg that is between thirteen and fourteen 
hands presented himself, and you would be pleased to purchase him for me, one of 
your servants might ride him to Euston, and I might receive him there. This, sir, 
is just as such a thing happens. If you hear, too, of a Welch widow, with a good 
joincture, that has her goings and is not very skittish, pray be pleased to cast your 
eye on her for me, too. You see, sir, the great trust I repose in your skill and hon- 
our, when I dare put two such commissions in your hand " — The Hanmer 

Correspondence, p. 120. 

FROM MR. PRIOR. 

" Paris, \st—\2th May, 1714. 
"My dear Lord and Friend, 

" Matthew never had so great occasion to write a word to Henry as now : it 
is noised here that I am soon to return. The question that I wish I could answer 
to the many that ask, and to our friend Colbert de Torcy (to whom I made your 
compliments in the manner you commanded) is, what is done for me ; and to what 
I am recalled ? It may look like a bagatelle what is to become of a philosopher like 
me ? but it is not such : what is to become of a person who had the honour to be 
chosen, and sent hither as intrusted, in the midst of a war, with what the queen de- 
signed should make the peace ; returning with the Lord Bolingbroke, one of the 
greatest men in England, and of the finest heads in Europe (as they say here, if 
true or not, n'importe) ; having been left by him in the greatest character (that of 
Her Majesty's Plenipotentiary), exercising that power conjointly with the Duke of 
Shrewsbury, and solely after his departure ; having here received more distinguished 
honour than any minister, except an Ambassador, ever did, and some which were 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 146 

slightingly of Prior's verses, enjoyed them more than he 
was willins: to own. The old moralist had studied them 



never given to any, but who had that character ; having had all the success that 
could be expected, having (God be thanked !) spared no pains, at a time when at 
home the peace is voted safe and honourable — at a time when the Earl of Oxford 
is Lord Treasurer and Lord Bolingbroke First Secretary of State ? This unfor- 
tunate person, I say, neglected, forgot, unnamed to anything that may speak the 
queen satisfied with his services, or his friends concerned as to his fortune. 

" Mr. de Torcy put me quite out of countenance, the other day, by a pity that 
wounded me deeper than ever did the cruelty of the late Lord Godolphin. He said 
he would write to Robin and Harry about me. God forbid, my lord, that I should 
need any foreign intercession, or owe the least to any Frenchman living, besides 
the decency of behaviour and the returns of common civility. Some say I am to 
go to Baden, others that I am to be added to the Commissioners for settling the 
commerce. In all cases I am ready, but in the mean time, die aliquid de tribus ca- 
pellis. Neither of these two are, I presume, honours or rewards ; neither of them 
(let me say to my dear Lord Bolingbroke, and let him not be angry with me), are 
what Drift may aspire to, and what Mr. Whitworth, who was his fellow clerk, has 
or may possess. I am far from desiring to lessen the great merit of the gentleman 
I named, for I heartily esteem and love him ; but in this trade of ours, my Lord, in 
which you are the general, as in that of the soldiery, there is a certain right ac- 
quired by time and long service. You would do anything for your Queen's service, 
but you would not be contented to descend, and be degraded to a charge, no way 
proportioned to that of Secretary of State, any more than Mr. Ross, though he 
would charge a party with a halbard in his hand, would be content all his life after 
to be Serjeant. Was my Lord Dartmouth, from Secretary, returned again to be 
Commissioner of Trade, or from Secretary of War, wpuld Frank Gwin think him- 
self kindly used to be returned again to be Commissioner ? In short, my lord, you 
have put me above myself, ,ind if I am to return to myself, I shall return to some- 
thing very discontented and uneasy. I am sure, my lord, you will make the best 
use you can of this hint for my good. If I am to have anything it will certainly be 
for Her Majesty's service, and the credit of my friends in the Ministry, that it be 
done before I am recalled from home, lest the world may think either that I have 
merited to be disgraced, or that ye dare not stand by me. If nothing is to be done, 
fiat voluntas Dei. I have writ to Lord Treasurer upon this subject, and having im- 
plored your kind intercession, I promise you it is the last remonstrance of this kind 
that I will ever make. Adieu, my lord ; all honour, health, and pleasure to you. 

" Yours ever, " Matt. 

"P.S. Lady Jersey is just gone from me. We drank your healths together in 
Usquebaugh after our tea : we are the greatest friends alive. Once more adieu. 
There is no such thing as the ' Book of Travels' you mentioned : if thiJiC be let 



146 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

as well as Mr. Thomas Moore, and defended them, and 
showed that he remembered them very well too, on an oc- 
casion when their morality was called in question by that 
noted Puritan, James Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck.* 

In the great society of the wits, John Gray deserved to be 
a favourite, and to have a good place.° In his set all were 
fond of him. His success offended nobody. He missed a 
fortune once or twice. He was talked of for court favour, 
and hoped to win it ; but the court favour jilted him. 
Craggs gave him some South Sea Stock ; and at one time 



friend Tilson send us more particular account of them, for neither I nor Jacob 
Tonson can find them. Pray send Barton back to me, I hope with some comfort- 
able tidings." — Bolingbroke^s Letters. 

' "I asked whether Prior's Poems were to be printed entire ; Johnson said they 
were. I mentioned Lord Hales' censure of Prior in his preface to a collection of 
sacred poems, by various hands, published by him at Edinburgh a great many years 
ago, where he mentions ' these impure tales, which will be the eternal opprobrium 
of their ingenious author.' Johnson: ' Sir, Lord Hales has forgot. There is noth- 
ing in Prior that will excite to lewdness. If Lord Hales thinks there is, he must 
be more combustible than other people.' I instanced the tale of ' Paulo Purganti 
and his wife.' Johnson : ' Sir, there is nothing there but that his wife wanted to 
be kissed, when poor Paulo was out of pocket. No sir. Prior is a lady's book. No 
lady is ashamed to have it standing in her library.' " — Boswell's Life of Johnson. 

" Gay was of an old Devonshire family, but his pecuniary prospects not being 
great, was placed in his youth in the house of a silk mercer in London. He was 
born in 1688 — Pope's year, and in 1712 the Duchess of Monmouth made him her 
secretary. Next year he published his " Rural Sports," which he dedicated to 
Pope, and so made an acquaintance, which became a memorable friendship. 

" Gay," says Pope, " was quite a natural man, — wholly without art or design, 
and spoke just what he thought and as he thought it. He dangled for twenty years 
about a court, and at last was offered to be made usher to the young princess. 
Secretary Craggs made Gay a present of stock in the South Sea year ; and he was 
once worth 20,000/., but lost it all again. He got about 500?. by the first Beggar's 
Opera, and 1100/. or 1200/. by the second. He was negligent and a bad manager. 
Latterly, the Duke of Queensberry took his money into his keeping, and let him 
only have what was necessary out of it, and, as he lived with them, he could not 
have occasion for much. He died worth upwards of 3000/." — Pope (Spence's 
Anecdotes). 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 147 

Gray had very nearly made his fortune. But Fortune shook 
her swift wings and jilted him too : and so his friends, in- 
stead of being angry with him, and jealous of him, were 
jSb. kind and fond of honest Gray. In the portraits of the lit- 
■^^erary worthies of the early part of the last century, Gray's 
face is the pleasantest perhaps of all. It appears adorned 
with neither periwig nor night-cap (the full dress and neg- 
ligee of learning, without which the painters of those days 
scarcely ever pourtrayed wits), and he laughs at you over 
his shoulder with an honest boyish glee — an artless sweet 
humour. He was so kind, so gentle, so jocular, so delight- 
fully brisk at times, so dismally woe-begone at others, such 
a natural good-creature, that the Giants loved him. The 
great Swift was gentle and sportive with him,' as the enor- 
mous Brobdignag maids of honour were with little GruUi- 
ver. He could frisk and fondle round Pope," and sport, and 
bark, and caper without offending the most thin-skinned 



^ " Mr. Gay is, in all regards, as honest and sincere a man as ever I knew."— 
Swift, to Lady Betty Germaine, Jan. 1733. 

* " Of manners gentle, of affections mild ; 
In wit a man ; simplicity, a child ; 
With native humour tem'pring virtuous rage, 
Form'd to delight at once and lash the age ; 
Above temptation in a low estate. 
And uncorrupted e'en among the great : 
A safe companion, and an easy friend, 
Unblamed through life, lamented in the end. 
These are thy honours ! not that here thy bust 
Is mix'd with heroes, or with kings thy dust ; 
But that the worthy and the good shall say. 
Striking their pensive bosoms, ' Here lies Gay.' " 

Pope's Epitaph on Gay. 
" A hare who, in a civil way, 
Comply'd with everything, like Gay." 

Fables, " The Hare and many Friends." 



148 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

of poets and men ; and when he was jilted in that little 
court affair of which we have spoken, his warm-hearted 
patrons the Duke and Duchess of Q,ueensberry' (the ' Kitty, 



' " I can give no account of Gay," says Pope, curiously, " since he was raffled 
for, and won back by his Duchess." — Works, Roscoe''s Ed., vol, ix. p. 392. 

Here is the letter Pope wrote to him when the death of Queen Anne brought 
back Lord Clarendon from Hanover, and lost him the Secretaryship of that noble- 
man, of which he had had but a short tenure. 

Gay's court prospects were never happy from this time. — His dedication of the 
" Shepherd's Week" to Bolingbroke, Swift used to call the " original sin," which 
had hurt him with the house of Hanover. 

" Sept. 23, 1714. 

" Dkar Mr. Gay,— 

" Welcome to your native soil ! welcome to your friends ! thrice welcome to 
me ! whether returned in glory, blest with court interest, the love and familiarity of 
the great, and filled with agreeable hopes ; or melancholy with dejection, contem- 
plative of the changes of fortune, and doubtful for the future ; whether returned a 
triumphant Whig or a depending Tory, equally all hail ! equally beloved and wel- 
come to me ! If happy, I am to partake of your elevation ; if unhappy, you have 
still a warm corner in my heart, and a retreat at Benfield in the worst of times at 
your service. If you are a Tory, or thought so by any man, I know it can proceed 
from nothing but your gratitude to a few people who endeavoured to serve you, and 
whose politics were never your concern. If you are a Whig, as I rather hope, and 
as I think your principles and mine (as brother poets) had ever a bias to the side 
of liberty, I know you will be an honest man and an inoffensive one. Upon the 
whole, I know you are incapable of being so much of either party as to be good for 
nothing. Therefore, once more, whatever you are or in whatever state you are, all 
hail! 

" One or two of your own friends complained they had nothing from you since 
the Queen's death; I told them no man living loved Mr. Gay better than I, yet 1 
had not once written to him in all his voyage. This I thought a convincing proof, 
but truly one may be a friend to another without telling him so every month. But 
they had reasons, too, themselves to allege in your excuse, as men who really 
value one another will never want such as make their friends and themselves easy. 
The late universal concern in public affairs threw us all into a hurry of spirits : 
even I, who am more a philosopher than to expect anything from any reign, was 
borne away with the current, and full of the expectation of the successor. During 
your journeys, I knew not whither to aim a letter aftei you ; that was a sort of 
shooting flying : add to this the demand Homer had upon me, to write fifty verses 
a day, besides learned notes, all of which are at a conclusion for this year. Rejoice 
with me, O my friend ! that my labour is over ; come and make merry with me in 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 149 

beautiful and young,' of Prior) pleaded his cause with in- 
dignation, and quitted the court in a huff, carrying off 
with them into their retirement their kind, gentle, protege. 
With these kind, lordly folks, a real Duke and Duchess, as 
delightful as those who harboured Don Q,uixotte, and loved 
the dear old Sancho, Gray lived, and was lapped in cotton, 
and had his plate of chicken, and his saucer of cream, and 
frisked, and barked, and wheezed, and grew fat, and so 
ended.* He became very melancholy, and lazy, sadly 
plethoric, and only occasionally diverting in his latter days. 
But everybody loved him, and the remembrance of his pret- 
ty little tricks ; and the raging old Dean of St. Patrick's, 



much feasting. We will feed among the lilies (by the lilies I mean the ladies). 
Are not the Rosalindas of Britain as charming as the Blousalindas of the Hague ? 
or have the two great Pastoral poets of our own nation renounced love at the same 
time ? for Phillips, unnatural Phillips, hath deserted it, yea, and in a rustic manner 
kicked his Rosalind. Dr. Pamell and I have been inseparable ever since you went. 
We are now at the Bath, where (if you are not, as I heartily hope, better engaged) 
your company would be the greatest pleasure to us in the world. Talk not of ex- 
penses : Homer shall support his children. I beg a line from you, directed to the 
Post-house in Bath. Poor Pamell is in an ill state of health. 

" Pardon me if I add a word of advice in the poetical way. Write something on 
the king, or prince, or princess. On whatsoever foot you may be with the court, 
this can do no harm. I shall never know where to end, and am confounded in the 
many things I have to say to you, though they all amount but to this, that I am en- 
tirely, as ever, 

" Your," &c. 

Gay took the advice "in the poetical way," and published " An Epistle to a Lady, 
occasioned by the arrival of her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales." But, 
though this brought him access to Court, and the attendance of the Prince and 
Princess at his farce of the " What d'ye call it," it did not bring him a place. On 
the accession of George II., he was offered the situation of Gentleman Usher to the 
Princess Louisa (her Highness being then two years old) ; but " by this offer," 
says Johnson, " he thought himself insulted." 

1 " Gay was a great eater. — As the French philosopher used to prove his exist- 
ence by cogito, ergo sum, the greatest proof of Gay's existence is, edit, ergo est." 
CoNGRKVE, m a Letter to Pope (Spence's Anecdotes). 



150 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

chafing in his banishment, was afraid to open the letter 
which Pope wrote him, announcing the sad news of the 
death of Gay.' 

Swift's letters to him are beautiful ; and having no pur- 
pose but kindness in writing to him, no party aim to advo- 
cate, or slight or anger to wreak, every word the Dean says 
to his favourite is natural, trustworthy, and kindly. His 
admiration for Gray's parts and honesty, and his laughter at 
his weaknesses, were alike just and genuine. He paints 
his character in wonderful pleasant traits of jocular satire. 
" I writ lately to Mr. Pope," Swift says, writing to Gay ; 
"I wish you had a little villakin in his neighbourhood; 
but you are yet too volatile, and any lady with a coach and 
six horses would carry you to Japan." "If your ramble," 
says Swift, in another letter, " was on horseback, I am glad 
of it, on account of your health ; but I know your arts of 
packing up a journey between stage-coaches and friends' 
coaches — for you are as arrant a cockney as any hosier in 
Cheapside. I have often had it in my head to put it into 
yours, that you ought to have some great work in scheme, 



* Swift indorsed the letter — " On my dear friend Mr. Gay's death ; received 
Dec. 15, but not read till the 20th, by an impulse foreboding some misfortune." 

" It was by Swift's interest that Gay was made known to Lord Bolingbroke, and 
obtained his patronage." — Scott's Swift, vol. i. p. 156. 

Pope wrote on the occasion of Gay's death, to Swift, thus : — 

" [Dec. 5, 1732.] 

. . . . " One of the nearest and longest ties I have ever had is broken all on a 
sudden by the unfortunate death of poor Mr. Gay. An inflammatory fever carried 

him out of this life in three days He asked of you a few hours before when 

in acute torment by the inflammation in his bowels and breast His sisters, 

we suppose, will be his heirs, who arc two widows Good God ! how often 

are we to die before wc go quite off this stage ? In every friend we lose a part of 
ourselves, and the best part. God keep those we have left ! Few are worth pray- 
ing for, and one's self the least of all." 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 151 

which may take up seven years to finish, hesides two or 
three under ones that may add another thousand pounds to 
your stock, and then I shall be in less pain about you. I 
know you can find dinners, but you love twelve-penny 
coaches too well, without considering that the interest of a 
whole thousand pounds brings you but half-a-crown a day :" 
and then Swift goes off from Gray to pay some grand com- 
pliments to Her Grrace the Duchess of Q,ueensberry, in 
whose sunshine Mr. Gay was basking, and in whose ra- 
diance the Dean would have liked to warm himself too. 

But we have Gray here before us, in these letters, — lazy, 
kindly, uncommonly idle ; rather slovenly, I am afraid ; for 
ever eating and saying good things ; a little, round, French 
abbe of a man, sleek, soft -handed, and soft-hearted. 

Our object in these lectures is rather to describe the men 
than their works ; or to deal with the latter only in as far 
as they seem to illustrate the character of their writers. 
Mr. Gray's ''Fables," which were written to benefit that 
amiable Prince, the Duke of Cumberland, the warrior of 
Dettingen and CuUoden, I have not, I own, been able to 
peruse since a period of very early youth ; and it must be 
confessed that they did not effect much benefit upon the 
illustrious young Prince, whose manners they were in- 
tended to mollify, and whose natural ferocity our gentle- 
hearted Satirist perhaps proposed to restrain. But the six 
pastorals called the " Shepherd's Week," and the buslesque 
poem of " Trivia," any man fond of lazy literature will find 
delightful, at the present day, and must read from begin- 
ning to end with pleasure. They are to poetry what 
charming little Dresden china figures are to sculpture : 
graceful, minikin, fantastic ; with a certain beauty always 



152 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

accompanying them. The pretty little personages of the 
pastoral, with gold clocks to their stockings, and fresh satin 
ribbons to their crooks and waistcoats and boddices, dance 
their loves to a minuet-tune played on a bird-organ, ap- 
proach the charmer, or rush from the false one daintily on 
their red-heeled tiptoes, and die of despair or rapture, with 
the most pathetic little grins and ogles; or repose, simper- 
ing at each other, under an arbour of pea-green crockery ; 
or piping to pretty flocks that have just been washed with 
the best Naples in a stream of Bergamot. Gray's gay plan 
seems to me far pleasanter than that of Phillips — his rival 
and Pope's — a serious and dreary idyllic cockney ; not that 
Gray's " Bumkinets and Hobnelias" are a whit more natural 
than the would-be serious characters of the other posture- 
master ; but the quality of this true humourist was to laugh 
and make laugh, though always with a secret kindness and 
tenderness, to perform the drollest little antics and capers, 
but always with a certain grace, and to sweet music, — as 
you may have seen a Savoyard boy abroad, with a hurdy- 
gurdy and a monkey, turning over head and heels, or clat- 
tering and pirouetting in a pair of wooden shoes, yet al- 
ways with a look of love and appeal in his bright eyes, and 
a smile that asks and wins affection and protection. Hap- 
py they who have that sweet gift of nature ! It was this 
which made the great folks and court ladies free and 
frieedly with John Gray — which made Pope and Arbuthnot 
love him — which melted the savage heart of Swift when 
he thought of him — and drove away, for a moment or two, 
the dark frenzies which obscured the lonely tyrant's brain, 
as he heard Gray's voice with its simple melody and artless 
ringing laughter. t 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 153 

What used to be said about Rubini, quHl avail des 
larmes dans la voix, may be said of Gray,' and of one 
other humourist of whom we shall have to speak. In al- 
most every ballad of his, however slight;" in the "Beg- 



' " Gay, like Goldsmith, had a musical talent. ' He could play on the flute,' says 
Malone, 'and was, therefore, enabled to adapt so happily some of the airs in the 
Beggar^s Opera.' " — Notes to SPKNCE. 

s " T'was when the seas were roaring 

With hollow blasts of wind, 
A damsel lay deploring 

All on a rock reclined. 
Wide o'er the foaming billows 

She cast a wistful look ; 
Her head was crown'd with willows 

That trembled o'er the brook. 

" ' Twelve months are gone and over. 

And nine long tedious days ; 
Why didst thou, venturous lover, — 

Why did'st thou trust the seas? 
Cease, cease, thou cruel Ocean, 

And let my lover rest ; 
Ah ! what's thy troubled motion 

To that within my breast ? 

" ' The merchant robb'd of pleasure, 

Sees tempests in despair ; 
But what's the loss of treasure 

To losing of my dear ? 
Should you some coast be laid on. 

Where gold and diamonds grow, 
You'd find a richer maiden. 

But none that loves you so. 

" ' How can they say that Nature 

Has nothing made in vain ; 
Why then beneath the water 

Should hideous rocks remain ? 
No eyes the rocks discover 

That lurk beneath the deep. 
To wreck the wandering lover, 

And leave the maid to weep?' 

G2 



154 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

gar's Opera'" and in its wearisome continuation (where the 
verses are to the full as pretty as in the first piece, how- 
ever), there is a peculiar, hinted, pathetic sweetness and 
melody. It charms and melts you. It is indefinable, but 
it exists ; and is the property of John Gray's and Oliver 
Groldsmith's best verse, as fragrance is of a violet, or fresh- 
ness of a rose. 

Let me read a piece from one of his letters, which is 
so famous that most people here are no doubt familiar 



" All melancholy lying, 

Thus wail'd she for her dear ; 
Repay'd each blast with sighing, 

Each billow with a tear ; 
When o'er the white wave stooping, 

His floating corpse she spy'd ; 
Then, like a lily drooping. 

She bow'd her head, and died." 

A Ballad, from the "What d'ye call it." 
" What can be prettier than Gay's ballad, or rather Swift's, Arbuthnot's, Pope's, 
and Gay's, in the ' What d'ye call it,' ' T'was when the seas were roaring V I 
have been well informed, that they all contributed." — Cowper to Unwin, 1783. 

' " Dr. Swift had been observing once to Mr. Gay, what an odd pretty sort of 
thing a Newgate Pastoral might make. Gay was inclined to try at such a thing, 
for some time, but afterwards thought it would be better to write a comedy on the 
same plan. This was what gave rise to the ' Beggar's Opera.' He began on it, and 
when he first mentioned it to Swift, the Doctor did not much like the project. As 
he carried it on, he showed what he wrote to both of us ; and we now and then 
gave a correction, or a word or two of advice : but it was wholly of his own writ- 
ing. When it was done, neither of us thought it would succeed. We showed it 
to Congreve, who, after reading it over, said, ' it would either take greatly or be 
damned confoundedly.' We were all at the first nij^ht of it, in great uncertainty of 
the event ; till we were very much encouraged by overhearing the Duke of Argyle, 
who sat in the next box to us, say, ' it will do — it must do ! — I see it in the eyes of 
them !' Tliis was a good while before the first act was over, and so gave us ease 
soon ; for the Duke [besides his own good taste] has a more particular research than 
any one now living, in discovering the fas-te of the public. He was (juite right in 
this as usual ; the good nature of the audience appeared stronger and stronger 
every act, and ended in a clamour of applause." — Pope {Spcnce''s Anecdotes). 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 155 

with it, but so delightful that it is always pleasant to 
hear : — 

" I have just passed part of this summer at an old romantic seat of my Lord Har- 
court's, which he lent me. It overlooks a common hayfield, where, under the shade 
of a haycock, sat two lovers — as constant as ever were found in romance — beneath 
a spreading bush. The name of the one (let it sound as it will) was John Hewet; 
of the other, Sarah Drew. John was a well-set man, about five and twenty ; Sarah, 
a brave woman of eighteen. John had for several months borne the labour of the 
day in the same field with Sarah ; when she milked, it was his morning and even- 
ing charge to bring the cows to her pails. Their love was the talk, hut not the 
scandal, of the whole neighbourhood, for all they aimed at was the blameless pos- 
session of each other in marriage. It was but this very morning that he had ob- 
tained her parents' consent, and it was but till the next week that they were to 
wait to be happy. Perhaps this very day, in the intervals of their work, they were 
talking of their wedding clothes ; and John was now matching several kinds of pop- 
pies and field-flowers, to make her a present of knots for the day. While they 
were thus employed (it was on the last of July), a terrible storm of thundnr and 
lightning arose, that drove the labourers to what shelter the trees or hedges afforded. 
Sarah, frightened and out of breath, sunk on a haycock ; and John (who never 
separated from her) sat by her side, having raked two or three heaps together, to 
secure her. Immediately, there was heard so loud a crash, as if heaven had burst 
asunder. The labourers, all solicitous for each other's safety, called to one another : 
those that were nearest our lovers, hearing no answer, stepped to the place where 
they lay : they first saw a little smoke, and after this faithful pair — John, with one 
arm about his Sarah's neck, and the other held over her face, as if to screen her 
from the lightning. They were struck dead, and already grown stiff and cold in this 
tender posture. There was no mark or discolouring on their bodies — only that 
Sarah's eyebrow was a little singed, and a small spot between her breasts. They 
were buried the next day in one grave !" 

And the proof that this description is delightful and 
heautiful is, that the great Mr. Pope admired it so much 
that he thought proper to steal it and to send it off to a cer- 
tain lady and wit, with whom he pretended to be in love 
in those days — my Lord Duke of Kingston's daughter, and 
married to Mr. Wortley Montagu, then his Majesty's Am- 
bassador at Constantinople. 

We are now come to the greatest name on our list — the 
highest among the poets, the highest among the English 



166 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

wits and humourists with whom we have to rank him. 
If the author of the " Dunciad" be not a humourist, if the 
poet of the " Rape of the Lock" be not a wit, who de- 
serves to be called so ? Besides that brilliant genius, and 
immense fame, for both of which we should respect him, 
men of letters should admire him as being one of the greatest 
literary artists that England has seen. He polished, he 
refined, he thought ; he took thoughts from other works to 
adorn and complete his own ; borrowing an idea or a ca- 
dence from another poet as he would a figure or a simile 
from a flower, or a river, stream, or any object which struck 
him in his walk, or contemplation of Nature. He began 
to imitate at an early age ;' and taught himself to write 



* " Waller, Spenser, and Dryden were Mr. Pope's great favourites, in the order 
they are named in his first reading, till he was about twelve years old." — Pope 
(^Spence's Anecdotes). 

" Mr. Pope's father (who was an honest merchant and dealt in Hollands, whole- 
sale) was no poet, but he used to set him to make English verses when very young. 
He was pretty difficult in being pleased ; and used often to send him back to new 
turn them. ' These are not good rhimes ;' for that was my husband's word for 
verses." — Pope's Mother (Spence). 

" I wrote things. I'm ashamed to say how soon. Part of an Epic Poem when 
about twelve. The scene of it lay at Rhodes, and some of the neighbouring isl- 
ands ; and the poem opened under water with a description of the Court of Nep- 
tune." — Pope {Ibid). 

" His perpetual application (after he set to study, of himself) reduced him in four 
years' time to so bad a state of health, that, after trying physicians for a good while 
in vain, he resolved to give way to his distemper ; and sat down calmly in a full 
expectation of death in a short time. Under this thought, he wrote letters to take 
a last farewell of some of his more particular friends, and among the rest one to the 
Abbe Southcote. The Abbe was extremely concerned, both for his very ill state 
of health and the resolution he said he had taken. He thought there might yet be 
hope, and went immediately to Dr. Radcliffe, with whom he was well acquainted, 
told him Mr. Pope's case, got full directions from him, and carried them down to 
Pope in Windsor Forest. The chief thing the doctor ordered him was to apply less, 
and to ride every day. The following his advice soon restored him to his health." 
—Pope {Ibid). 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 157 

by copying printed books. Then he passed into the hands 
of the priests, and from his first clerical master, who came 
to him when he was eight years old, he went to a school at 
Twyford, and another school at Hyde Park, at which' places 
he unlearned all that he had got from his first instructor. 
At twelve years old, he went with his father into Windsor 
Forest, and there learned for a few months under a fourth 
priest. " And this was all the teaching I ever had," he 
said, " and G-od knows it extended a very little way." 

When he had done with his priests he took to reading 
by himself, for which he had a very great eagerness and 
enthusiasm, especially for poetry. He learned versification 
from Dryden, he said. In his youthful poem of "Alcan- 
der," he imitated every poet, Cowley, Milton, Spenser, 
Statius, Homer, Virgil. In a few years he had dipped into 
a great number of the English, French, Italian, Latin, and 
Grreek poets. " This I did," he says, " without any design 
except to amuse myself ; and got the languages by hunting 
after the stories in the several poets I read, rather than read 
the books to get the languages. I followed everywhere as 
my fancy led me, and was like a boy gathering flowers in 
the fields and woods, just as they fell in his way. These 
five or six years I looked upon as the happiest in my life." 
Is not here a beautiful holiday picture ? The forest and the 
fairy story-book — the boy spelling Ariosto or Virgil under 
the trees, battling with the Cid for the love of Chimene, 
or dreaming of Armida's garden — peace and sunshine round 
about — the kindest love and tenderness waiting for him at 
his quiet home yonder — and G-enius throbbing in his young 
heart, and whispering to him, " You shall be great ; you 
shall be famous ; you, too, shall love and sing ; you will 



158 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

sing her so nobly that some kind heart shall forget you are 
weak and ill-formed. Every poet had a love. Fate must 
give one to you too," — and day by day he walks the forest, 
very likely looking out for that charmer. " They were the 
happiest days of his life," he says, when he was only dream- 
ing of his fame : when he had gained that mistress she was 
no consoler. 

That charmer made her appearance, it would seem, 
about the year 1705, when Pope was seventeen. Letters 

of his are extant, addressed to a certain Lady M , 

whom the youth courted, and to whom he expressed his 
ardour in language, to say no worse of it, that is entirely 
pert, odious, and affected. He imitated love compositions 
as he had been imitating love poems just before — it was a 
sham mistress he courted, and a sham passion, expressed 
as became it. These unlucky letters found their way into 
print years afterwards, and were sold to the congenial Mr. 
Curll. If any of my hearers, as I hope they may, should 
take a fancy to look at Pope's correspondence, let them 
pass over that first part of it ; over, perhaps, almost all 
Pope's letters to women ; in which there is a tone of not 
pleasant gallantry, and, amidst a profusion of compliments 
and politenesses, a something which makes one distrust 
the little pert, prurient bard. There is very little indeed 
to say about his loves, and that little not edifying. He 
wrote flames and raptures, and elaborate verse and prose 
for Lady Mary Wortley Montagu ; but that passion prob- 
ably came to a climax in an impertinence and was extin- 
guished by a box on the ear, or some such rebuff, and he 
began on a sudden to hate her with a fervour much more 
genuine than that of his love had been. It was a feeble, 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 159 

puny grimace of love, and paltering with passion. After 
Mr. Pope had sent off one of his fine compositions to Lady 
Mary, he made a second draft from the rough copy, and 
favoured some other friend with it. He was so charmed 
with the letter of Gay's, that I have just quoted, that he 
had copied that and amended it, and sent it to Lady Mary 
as his own. A gentleman who writes letters a deux fins, 
and after having poured out his heart to the beloved, serves 
up the same dish rechauffe to a friend, is not very much 
in earnest about his loves, however much he may be in his 
piques and vanities when his impertinence gets its due. 

But, save that unlucky part of the Pope Correspondence, 
I do not know, in the range of our literature, volumes 
more delightful,' You live in them in the finest company 

' MR. POPE TO THE EEV. ME. BROOME, PULHAM, NORFOLK. 

" Aug. 29tk, 1730. 

" Dear Sir, — 

" I intended to write you on this melancholy subject, the death of Mr. Fen- 
ton, before yours came, but stayed to have informed myself and you of the circum- 
stances of it. All I hear is, that he felt a gradual decay, though go early in life, 
and was declining for five or six months. It was not, as I apprehended, the gout in 
his stomach, but, I believe, rather a complication first of gross humours, as he was 
naturally corpulent, not discharging themselves, as he used no sort of exercise. No 
man better bore the approaches of his dissolution (as I am told), or with less osten- 
tation yielded up his being. The great modesty which you know was natural to 
him, and the great contempt he had for all sorts of vanity and parade, never ap- 
peared more than in his last moments : he had a conscious satisfaction (no doubt) 
in acting right, in feeling himself honest, true, and unpretending to more than his 
own. So he died as he lived, with that secret, yet sufficient contentment. 

" As to any papers left behind him, I dare say they can be but few ; for this rea- 
son, he never wrote out of vanity, or thought much of the applause of men. I know 
an instance when he did his utmost to conceal his own merit that way ; and if we 
join to this his natural love of ease, I fancy we must expect little of this sort : at 
least, I have heard of none, except some few further remarks on Waller (which his 
cautious integrity made him leave an order to be given to Mr. Tonson), and per- 
haps, though it is many years since I saw it, a translation of the first book of ' Op- 
pian.' He had begun a tragedy of Dion, but made small progress in it. 



160 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

in the world. A little stately, perhaps ; a little apprete 
and conscious that they are speaking to whole generations 

" As to his other affairs, he died poor hut honest, leaving no debts or legacies, 
except of a few pounds to Mr. Trumball and ray lady, in token of respect, grateful- 
ness, and mutual esteem. 

" I shall, with pleasure, take upon me to draw this amiable, quiet, deserving, un- 
pretending, Christian, unphilosophical character in his epitaph. There truth may 
be spoken in a few words ; as for flourish, and oratory, and poetry, I leave them to 
younger and more lively writers, such as love writing for writing sake, and would 
rather show their own fine parts than report the valuable ones of any other man. 
So the elegy I renounce. 

" I condole with you from my heart on the loss of so worthy a man, and a friend 
to us both 

" Adieu ; let us love his memory, and profit by his example. Am very sincerely, 
dear sir, 

" Your affectionate and real servant." 

TO THE EARL OF BURLINGTON. 

" August, 1714. 

" My Lord, 

" If your mare could speak she would give you an account of what extraor- 
dinary company she had on the road, which, since she cannot do, I will. 

" It was the enterprising Mr. Lintot, the redoubtable rival of Mr. Tonson, who, 
mounted on a stone-horse, overtook me in Windsor Forest. He said he heard I de- 
signed for Oxford, the seat of the Muses, and would, as my bookseller, by all means 
accompany me thither. 

" I asked him where he got his horse ? He answered he got it of his publisher ; 
' for that rogue, my printer (said he), disappointed me. I hoped to put him in good 
humour by a treat at the tavern of a brown fricassee of rabbits, which cost ten shil- 
lings, with two quarts of wine, besides my conversation. I thought myself cock- 
sure of his horse, which he readily promised me, but said that Mr. Tonson had just 
such another design of going to Cambridge, expecting there the copy of a new kind 

of Horace from Dr. ; and if Mr. Tonson went, he was pre-engaged to attend 

him, being to have the printing of the said copy. So, in short, I borrowed this 
stone-horse of my publisher, which he had of Mr. Oldmixon for a debt. He lent 
me, too, the pretty boy you see after me. He was a smutty dog yesterday, and cost 
me more than two hours to wash the ink off his face ; but the devil is a fair condi- 
tioned dovil, and very forward in his catechism. If you have any more bags he 
shall carry them.' 

" I thought Mr. Lintot's civility not to be neglected, so gave the boy a small bag 
containing three shirts and an Elzevir Virgil, and, mounting in an instant, pro- 
ceeded on the road, with my man before, my courteous stationer beside, and the 
aforesaid devil behind. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 161 

who are listening ; but in the tone of their voices — pitched, 
as no doubt they are, beyond the mere conversation key — 

" Mr. Lintot began in this manner : ' Now, damn them ! What if they should put 
it into the newspaper how you and I went together to Oxford ? What would 1 
care ? If I should go down into Sussex they would say I was gone to the Speaker ; 
but what of that ? If my son were but big enough to go on with the business, by 
G — d, I would keep as good company as old Jacob.' 

" Hereupon, I inquired of his son. ' The lad (says he) has fine parts, but is 
somewhat sickly, much as you are. I spare for nothing in his education at West- 
minster. Pray, don't you think Westminster to be the best school in England ? 
Most of the late Ministry came out of it ; so did many of this Ministry. I hope the 
boy will make his fortune.' 

" ' Don't you design to let him pass a year at Oxford V ' To what purpose ? 
(said he). The Universities do but make pedants, and I intend to breed him a 
man of business.' 

" As Mr. Lintot was talking I observed he sat uneasy on his saddle, for which I 
expressed some solicitude. ' Nothing (says he). I can bear it well enough ; but, 
since we have the day before us, methinks it would be very pleasant for you to rest 
awhile under the woods.' When we were alighted, ' See, here, what a mighty 
pretty Horace I have in my pocket ! What, if you amused yourself in turning an 
ode till we mount again ? Lord ! if you pleased. What a clever miscellany might 
you make at leisure hours !' ' Perhaps I may,' said I, ' if we ride on ; the motion 
is an aid to my fancy ; a round trot very much awakens my spirits ; then jog on 
apace, and I'll think as hard as I can.' 

" Silence ensued for a full hour ; after which Mr. Lintot lugged the reins, stopped 
short, and broke out, ' Well, sir, how far have you gone ?' I answered, seven miles. 
' Z — ds, sir,' said Lintot, ' I thought you had done seven stanzas. Oldsworth, in a 
ramble round Wimbleton-hill, would translate a whole ode in half this time. I'll 
say that for Oldsworth [though I lost by his Timothy's] he translates an ode of Hor- 
ace the quickest of any man in England. I remember Dr. King would write verses 
in a tavern, three hours after he could not speak : and there is Sir Richard, in that 
rumbling old chariot of his, between Fleet-ditch and St. Giles's pound, shall make 
you half a Job.' 

" ' Pray, Mr. Lintot' (said I), ' now you talk of translators, what is your method 
of managing them ?' ' Sir' (replied he), 'these are the saddest pack of rogues in the 
VFOrld : in a hungry fit, they'll swear they understand all the languages in the uni- 
verse. I have known one of them take down a Greek book upon my counter, and 
cry, " Ah, this is Hebrew," and must read it from the latter end. By G — d, I can 
never be sure in these fellows, for I neither understand Greek, Latin, French, nor 
Italian myself. But this is my way ; I agree with them for ten shillings per sheet, 
with a proviso that I will have their doings corrected with whom I please ; so by 
one or the other they are led at last to the true sense of an author; my judgment 



162 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

in the expression of their thoughts, their various views and 
natures, there is something generous, and cheering, and 



giving the negative to all my translators.' ' Then how are you sure these correct- 
ors may not impose upon you ?' ' Why I get any civil gentleman (especially any 
Scotchman) that comes into my shop, to read the original to me in English ; by 
this I know whether my first translator be deficient, and whether my corrector mer- 
its his money or not. 

" ' I'll tell you what happened to me last month. I bargained with S ■ for 

a new version of " Lucretius," to publish against Tonson's, agreeing to pay the 
author so many shillings at his producing so many lines. He made a great prog- 
ress in a very short time, and I gave it to the corrector to compare with the Lat- 
in ; but he went directly to Creech's translation, and found it the same, word for 
word, all but the first page. Now, what d'ye think I did ? I arrested the translator 
for a cheat ; nay, and I stopped the corrector's pay, too, upon the proof that he had 
made use of Creech instead of the original.' 

" ' Pray tell me next how you deal with the critics ?' ' Sir,' said he, ' nothing 
more easy. I can silence the most formidable of them : the rich ones for a sheet 
a-piece of the blotted manuscript, which cost me nothing ; they'll go about with it to 
their acquaintance, and pretend they had it from the author, who submitted it to 
their correction : this has given some of them such an air, that in time they come 
to be consulted with and dedicated to as the tip-top critics of the town. — As for the 
poor critics, I'll give you one instance of my management, by which you may guess 
the rest : a lean man, that looked like a very good scholar, came to me, t'other day ; 
he turned over your Homer, shook his head, shrugged up his shoulders, and pish'd 
at every line of it. " One would wonder" (says he) " at the strange presumption 
of some men ; Homer is no such easy task as every stripling, every versifier" — he 
was going on, when my wife called to dinner ; " sir," said I, " will you please to 
eat a piece of beef with me ?" " Mr. Lintot," said he, " I am very sorry you should 
be at the expense of this great book, I am really concerned on your account." 
" Sir, I am much obliged to you : if you can dine upon a piece of beef together with 
a slice of pudding ?" — " Mr. Lintot, I do not say but Mr. Pope, if he would conde- 
scend to advise with men of learning." — " Sir, the pudding is upon the table, if 
you please to go in." My critic complies ; he comes to a taste of your poetry, 
and tells me in the same breath, that the book is commendable, and the poetry ex- 
cellent. 

" ' Now, sir,' continued Mr. Lintot, ' in return to the frankness I have shown, 
pray tell me, is it the opinion of your friends at Court that my Lord Lansdowne 
will be brought to the bar or not V I told him I heard he would not, and I hoped 
it, my Lord being one I had particular obligations to. — ' That may be,' replied Mr. 
Lintot ; ' but by G — if he is not, I shall lose the printing of a very good trial.' 

"These, my Lord, are a few traits with which you discern the genius of Mr. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 1C3 

ennobling. You are in the society of men who have filled 
the greatest parts in the world's story — you are with St. 



Lintot, which I have chosen for the subject of a letter. I dropped him as soon as I 

got to Oxford, and paid a visit to my Lord Carleton, at Middleton 

" I am," &c. 

DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE. 

" Sept. 29, 1725. 

" 1 am now returning to the noble scene of Dublin — into the grand monde — for 
fear of burying my parts ; to signalize myself among curates and vicars, and correct 
all corruptions crept in relating to the weight of bread-and-butter through those do- 
minions where I govern. I have employed my time (besides ditching) in finishing, 
correcting, amending, and transcribing my travels [Gulliver's], in four parts com- 
plete, newly augmented, and intended for the press when the world shall deserve 
them, or rather, when a printer shall be found brave enough to venture his ears. I 
like the scheme of our meeting after distresses and dissensions ; but the chief end 
I propose to myself in all my labours is to vex the world rather than divert it ; and 
if I could compass that design without hurting my own person or fortune, I would 
be the most indefatigable writer you have ever seen, without reading. I am exceed- 
ingly pleased that you have done with translations ; Lord Treasurer Oxford often 
lamented that a rascally world should lay you under a necessity of misemploymg 
your genius for so long a time ; but since you will now be so much better employed, 
when you think of the w^orld, give it one lash the more at my request. I have ever 
hated all societies, professions, and communities ; and all my love is towards indi- 
viduals, — for instance, I hate the tribe of lawyers, but I love Counsellor Such-a-one 
and Judge Such-a-one : it is so with physicians (I will not speak of my own trade), 
soldiers, English, Scotch, French, and the rest. But principally I hate and detest 
that animal called man — although I heartily love John, Peter, Thomas, and so on. 

. ..." I have got materials towards a treatise proving the falsity of that defini- 
tion animal rationale, and to show it should be only rationis capax The 

matter is so clear that it will admit of no dispute — nay, I will hold a hundred 
pounds that you and I agree in the point 

" Dr. Lewis sent me an account of Dr. Arbuthnot's illness, which is a very sens- 
ible affliction to me, who, by living so long out of the world, have lost that hard- 
ness of heart contracted by years and general conversation. I am daily losing 
friends, and neither seeking nor getting others. Oh if the world had but a dozen 
of Arbuthnots in it, I would bum my ' Travels !' " 

MR. POPE TO DR. SWIFT. 

" October 15, 1725. 
" I am wonderfully pleased with the suddenness of your kind answer. It makes 
me hope you are coming towards us, and that you incline more and more to your 



164 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

John the statesman ; Peterborough, the conqueror ; Swift, 
the greatest wit of all times ; Gay, the kindliest laugher 
— it is a privilege to sit in that company. Delightful and 
generous banquet I with a little faith and a little fancy 
any one of us here may enjoy it, and conjure up those 
great figures out of the past, and listen to their wit and 
wisdom. Mind that there is always a certain cachet about 
great men — they may be as mean on many points as you 
or I, but they carry their great air — they speak of common 
life more largely and generously than common men do — 
they regard the world with a manlier countenance, and 



old friends. . . . Here is one [Lord Bolingbroke] who was once a powerful planet, 
but has now (after long experience of all that comes of shining) learned to be con- 
tent with returning to his first point without the thought or ambition of shining at 
all. Here is another [Edward, Earl of Oxford], who thinks one of the greatest 
glories of his father was to have distinguished and loved you, and who loves you 
hereditarily. Here is Arbuthnot, recovered from the jaws of death, and more 
pleased with the hope of seeing you again than of reviewing a world, every part of 
which he has long despised but what is made up of a few men like yourself .... 

" Our friend Gay is used as the friends of Tories are by Whigs — and generally 
by Tories too. Because he had humour, he was supposed to have dealt with Dr. 
Swift, in like manner as when any one had learning formerly, he was thought to 
have dealt with the devil 

" Lord Bolingbroke had not the least harm by his fall ; I wish he had received no 
more by his other fall. But Lord Bolingbroke is the most improved mind since you 
saw him, that ever was improved without shifting into a new body, or being paullo 
minus ah angelis. I have often imagined to myself, that if ever all of us meet again, 
after so many varieties and changes, after so much of the old world and of the old 
man in each of us has been altered, that scarce a single thought of the one, any 
more than a single action of the other, remains just the same ; I have fancied, I 
say, that we should meet like the righteous in the millennium, quite at peace, di- 
vested of all our former passions, smiling at our past follies, and content to enjoy 
the kingdom of the just in tranquillity. 

"I designed to have left the following page for Dr. Arbuthnot to fill, liut he is so 
touched with the period in yours to me, concerning him, that he intends to answer 
it by a whole letter." * * * 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 165 



see its real features more fairly than the timid shufflers 
who only dare to look up at life through blinkers, or to 
have an opinion when there is a crowd to back it. He 
who reads these noble records of a past age, salutes and 
reverences the great spirits who adorn it. You may go 
home now and talk with St. John ; you may take a volume 
from your library and listen to Swift and Pope. 

Might I give counsel to any young hearer, I would say 
to him, try to frequent the company of your betters. In 
books and life that is the most wholesome society ; learn 
to admire rightly ; the great pleasure of life is that. Note 
what the great men admired ; they admired great things : 
narrow spirits admire basely, and worship meanly. I know 
nothing in any story more gallant and cheering, than the 
love and friendship which this company of famous men 
bore towards one another. There never has been a society 
of men more friendly, as there never was one more illus- 
trious. Who dares quarrel with Mr. Pope, great and fa- 
mous himself, for liking the society of men great and fa- 
mous ? and for liking them for the qualities which made 
them so? A mere pretty fellow from "White's could not 
have written the " Patriot King," and would very likely 
have despised little Mr. Pope, the decrepit Papist, whom 
the great St. John held to be one of the best and greatest 
of men : a mere nobleman of the Court could no more have 
won Barcelona, than he could have written Peterborough's 
letters to Pope,' which are as witty as Congreve : a mere 



* Of the Earl of Peterborough, Walpole says : — " He was one of those men of 
careless wit, and negligent grace, who scatter a thousand bans mots and idle verses, 
which we painful compilers gather and hoard, till the authors stare to find them- 
selves authors. Such was this Lord, of an advantageous figure, and enterprising 



166 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Irish Dean could not have written '' GruUiver ;" and all 
these men loved Pope, and Pope loved all these men. To 
name his friends is to name the best men of his time. Ad- 
dison had a senate ; Pope reverenced his equals. He spoke 
of Swift with respect and admiration always. His admi- 
ration for Bolingbroke was so great, that when some one 
said of his friend, " There is something in that great man 
which looks as if he was placed here by mistake," " Yes," 
Pope answered, " and when the comet appeared to us a 
month or two ago, I had sometimes an imagination that it 
might possibly be come to carry him home, as a coach 
comes to one's door for visitors." So these great spirits 
spoke of one another. Show me six of the dullest middle- 



spirit ; as gallant as Amadis and as brave ; but a little more expeditious in his 
journeys ; for he is said to have seen more kings and more postilions than any man 

in Europe He was a man, as his friend said, who would neither live nor die 

like any other mortal." 

FROM THE EARL OF PETERBOROUGH TO POPE. 

" You must receive my letter with a just impartiality, and give grains of allow- 
ance for a gloomy or rainy day ; I sink grievously with the weather-gla-ss, and am 
quite spiritless when oppressed with the thoughts of a birthday or a return. 

" Dutiful affection was bringing me to town, but undutiful laziness and being 
much out of order keep me in the country : however, if alive, I must make my ap- 
pearance at the birthday 

" You seem to think it vexatious that I shall allow you but one woman at a time 
either to praise or love. If I dispute with you on this point, I doubt, every fairy 
will give a verdict against me. So sir, with a Mahometan indulgence, I allow you 
pluralities, the favourite privileges of our church. 

" I find you don't mend upon correction ; again I tell you you must not think of 
women in a reasonable way : you know we always make Goddesses of those we 
adore upon earth ; and do not all the good men tell us we must lay aside reason in 

what relates to the Deity ? I should have been glad of anything of Swift's. 

Pray when you write to him next, tell him I expect him with impatience, in a place 
as odd and as out of the way as himself 

" Your's." 

Peterborough married Mrs. Anastasia Robinson, the celebrated singer. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 167 

aged gentlemen that ever dawdled round a club-table, so 
faithful and so friendly. 

We have said before that the chief wits of this time, 
with the exception of Congreve, were what we should now 
call men's men. They spent many hours of the four-and- 
twenty, a fourth part of each day nearly, in clubs, and cof- 
fee-houses, where they dined, drank, and smoked. Wit 
and news went by word of mouth ; a journal of 1710 con- 
tained the very smallest portion of one or the other. The 
chiefs spoke, the faithful habitues sate around ; strangers 
came to wonder and listen. Old Dryden had his head- 
quarters at Will's, in Russell-street, at the corner of Bow- 
street, at which place Pope saw him when he was twelve 
years old. The company used to assemble on the first 
floor — what was called the dining-room floor in those days 
— and sate at various tables smoking their pipes. It is 
recorded that the beaux of the day thought it a great hon- 
our to be allowed to take a pinch out of Dryden's snuff- 
box. When Addison began to reign, he with a certain 
crafty propriety — or policy let us call it — which belonged 
to his nature, set up his court, and appointed the officers 
of his royal house. His palace was Button's, opposite 
Will's.' A quiet opposition, a silent assertion of empire, 
distinguished this great man. Addison's ministers were 



* " Button had been a servant in the Countess of Warwick's family, who, under 
the patronage of Addison, kept a coffee-house on the south side of Russell-street, 
about two doors from Covent Garden. Here it was that the wits of that time used 
to assemble. It is said that when Addison had suffered any vexation from the 
Countess, he withdrew the company from Button's house. 

" From the coffee-house he went again to a tavern, where he often sat late and 
drank too much wine." — Dr. Johnson. 

Will's coffee-house was on the west side of Bow-street, and " corner of Russell- 
street." See "Handbook of London." 



168 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Budgell, Tickell, Philips, Carey ; his master of the horse, 
honest Dick Steele, who was what Duroc was to Napoleon, 
a Hardy to Nelson ; the man who performed his master's 
bidding, and would have cheerfully died in his quarrel. 
Addison lived with these people for seven or eight hours 
every day. The male society passed over their punch- 
bowls and tobacco-pipes, about as much time as ladies of 
that age spent over Spadille and Manille. 

For a brief space, upon coming up to town. Pope formed 
part of King Joseph's court, and was his rather too eager 
and obsequious humble servant.' Dick Steele, the editor 
of the " Tatler," Mr. Addison's man, and his own man too, 
— a person of no little figure in the world of letters, patron- 
ised the young poet ; and set him a task or two. Young 
Mr. Pope did the tasks very quickly and smartly (he had 
been at the feet quite as a boy of "Wycherley's" decrepit 



' " My acquaintance with Mr. Addison commenced in 1712 : I liked him then as 
well as I liked any man, and was very fond of his conversation. It was very soon 
after that Mr. Addison advised me ' not to be content with the applause of half the 
nation.' He used to talk much and often to me, of moderation in parties : and used 
to blame his dear friend Steele for being too much of a party man. He encouraged 
me in my design of translating the ' Iliad,' which was begun that year, and finished 
in 1718." — Pope (Spencers Anecdotes). 

" Addison had Budgell, and I think Philips, in the house with him. — Gay, they 
would call one of my eleves. — They were angry with me for keeping so much with 
Dr. Swift, and some of the late ministry." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes). 

' " TO MR. AI.CO0RT. 

"Jan. 21, 1715-16. 

" I know of nothing that will be so interesting to you at present as some circum- 
stances of the last act of that eminent comic poet and our friend, Wychcrley. He 
had often told me, and I doubt not he did all his acquaintance, that he would many 
as soon as his life was despaired of Accordingly, a few days before his death, he 
underwent the ceremony, and joined together those two sacraments which wise men 
say we should be the last to receive ; for, if you observe, matrimony is placed after 
extreme unction in our catechism, as a kind of hint of the order of time in which 
they are to be taken. The old man then lay down, satisfied in the consciousness 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 169 



reputation, and propped up for a year that doting old wit) : 
he was anxious to be well with the men of letters, to get 
a footing and a recognition. He thought it an honour to 
be admitted into their company ; to have the confidence of 
Mr. Addison's friend. Captain Steele. His eminent parts 
obtained for him the honour of heralding Addison's triumph 
of " Cato," with his admirable prologue, and heading the 
victorious procession as it were. Not content with this 
act of homage and admiration, he wanted to distinguish 
himself by assaulting Addison's enemies, and attacked 
John Dennis with a prose lampoon, which highly offend- 
ed his lofty patron. Mr. Steele was instructed to write 
to Mr. Dennis and inform him, that Mr. Pope's pamphlet 
against him was written quite without Mr. Addison's ap- 

of having, by this one act, obliged a woman who (he was told) had merit, and shown 
an heroic resentment of the ill-usage of his next heir. Some hundred pounds which 
he had with the lady, discharged his debts ; a jointure of 500Z. a year made her a 
recompense ; and the nephew was left to comfort himself as well as he could with 
the miserable remains of a mortgaged estate. I saw our friend twice after this was 
done — less peevish in his sickness than he used to be in his health ; neither much 
afraid of dying, nor (which in him had been more likely) much ashamed of marry- 
ing. The evening before he expired, he called his young wife to the bedside, and 
earnestly entreated her not to deny him one request — the last he should make. 
Upon her assurances of consenting to it, he told her: ' My dear, it is only this — 
that you will never marry an old man again.' I cannot help remarking that sick- 
ness, which often destroys both wit and wisdom, yet seldom has power to remove 
that talent which we call humour. Mr. Wycherley showed his even in his last 
compliment ; though I think his request a little hard, for why should he bar her 
from doubling her jointure on the same easy terms ? 

" So trivial as these circumstances are, I should not be displeased myself to 
know such trifles when they concern or characterize any eminent person. The 
wisest and wittiest of men are seldom wiser or wittier than others in these sober 
moments ; at least, our friend ended much in the same character he had lived in ; 
and Horace's rule for play may as well be applied to him as a playwright: — 

" ' Servetur ad imum, 
Qualis ab incepto processerit et sibi constet.' 

" I am," &c. 

H 



170 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

proval.' Indeed, " The Narrative of Dr. Robert Norris on the 
phrenzy of J. D.," is a vvilgar and mean satire, and such a 
blow as the magnificent Addison could never desire to see 
any partisan of his strike, in any literary quarrel. Pope 
was closely allied with Swift when he wrote this pamphlet. 
It is so dirty that it has been printed in Swift's works too. 
It bears the foul marks of the master hand. Swift admired 
and enjoyed with all his heart the prodigious genius of the 
young Papist lad out of Windsor Forest, who had never 
seen a University in his life, and came and conquered the 
Dons and the Doctors with his wit. He applauded, and 
loved him, too : and protected him, and taught him mis- 
chief. I wish Addison could have loved him better. The 
best satire that ever has been penned would never have 
been written then ; and one of the best characters the 
world ever knew, would have been without a flaw. But 
he who had so few equals could not bear one, and Pope was 
more than that. When Pope, trying for himself, and soar- 
ing on his immortal young wings, found that his, too, was 
a genius, which no pinion of that age could follow, he rose 
and left Addison's company, settling on his own eminence, 
singing his own song. 

It was not possible that Pope should remain a retainer 
of Mr. Addison ; nor likely that after escaping from his 
vassalage and assuming an independent crown, the sover- 
eign whose allegiance he quitted should view him amica- 
bly." They did not do wrong to mislike each other. They 

* " Addison, who was no stranger to the world, probably saw the selfishness of 
Pope's friendship ; and, resolving that he should have the consequences of his of- 
ficiousncss to himself, informed Dennis by Steele that he was sorry for the insult." 
— Johnson {Life of Addison) 

* " While I was heated with what I had heard, 1 wrote a letter to Mr. Addison, 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 171 

but followed the impulse of nature, and the consequence 
of position. When Bernadotte became heir to a throne, 
the Prince Royal of Sweden was naturally Napoleon's ene- 
my. " There are many passions and tempers of mankind," 
says Mr. Addison in the " Spectator," speaking a couple of 
years before their little differences between him and Mr. 
Pope took place, " which naturally dispose us to depress 
and vilify the merit of one rising in the esteem of mankind. 
All those who made their entrance into the world with the 
same advantages, and were once looked on as his equals, 
are apt to think the fame of his merits a reflection on their 
own deserts. Those, who were once his equals, envy and 
defame him, because they now see him the superior ; and 
those who were once his superiors, because they look upon 
him as their equal." Did Mr. Addison, justly perhaps 
thinking, that as young Mr. Pope had not had the benefit 
of a university education, he could not know Greek, there- 
fore he could not translate Homer, encourage his young 
friend, Mr. Tickell, of (Queen's, to translate that poet, and 
aid him with his own known scholarship and skill V It 
was natural that Mr. Addison should doubt of the learninsf 
of an amateur Grrecian ; should have a high opinion of Mr. 



to let him know 'that I was not unacquainted with this behaviour of his ; that if I 
was to speak of him severely in return for it, it should not be in such a dirty way ; 
that 1 should rather tell him himself fairly of his faults, and allow his good qualities ; 
and that it should be something in the following manner.' I then subjoined the first 
sketch of what has since been called my satire on Addison. He used me very civ- 
illy ever after ; and never did me any injustice, that I know of, from that time to 
his death, which was about three years after." — Pope (Spencers Anecdotes). 

' " That Tiikell should have been guilty of a villainy seems to us highly im- 
probable ; that Addison should have been guilty of a villainy seems to us highly 
improbable ; but that these two men should have conspired together to commit a vil- 
lainy, seems to us improbable in a tenfold degree." — Macaulay. 



172 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Tickell, of Q,ueen's ; and should help that ingenious young 
man. It was natural, on the other hand, that Mr. Pope 
and Mr. Pope's friends should believe that this counter- 
translation, suddenly advertised and so long written, though 
Tickell's college friends had never heard of it — though when 
Pope first wrote to Addison regarding his scheme, Mr. Ad- 
dison knew nothing of the similar project of Tickell, of 
Q,ueen's — it was natural that Mr. Pope and his friends, 
having interests, pensions, and prejudices of his own, should 
believe that Tickell's translation was but an act of oppo- 
sition against Pope, and that they should call Mr. Tickell's 
emulation Mr. Addison's envy — if envy it were. 

" And were there one whose fires 
True genius kindles and fair fame inspires, 
Blest with each talent and each art to please, 
And bom to write, converse, and live with ease ; 
Should such a man, too fond to rule alone. 
Bear like the Turk no brother near the throne ; 
View him with scornful yet with jealous eyes, 
Ajid hate, for arts that caused himself to rise ; 
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, 
And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer ; 
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, 
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike ; 
Alike reserved to blame as to commend, 
A timorous foe and a suspicious friend , 
Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged, 
And so obliging that he ne'er obliged ; 
Like Cato give his little senate laws. 
And sit attentive to his own applause ; 
While wits and templars every sentence raise, 
And wonder with a foolish face of praise ; 
Who but must laugh if such a man there be, 
Who would not weep if Atticus were he ?" 

" I sent the verses to Mr. Addison," said Pope, " and he 
used me very civilly ever after." No wonder he did. It 
was shame very likely more than fear that silenced him. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 173 

Johnson recounts an interview between Pope and Addison 
after their quarrel, in which Pope was angry, and Addison 
tried to he contemptuous and cahii. Such a weapon as 
Pope's must have pierced any scorn. It flashes for ever, 
and quivers in Addison's memory. His great figure looks 
out on us from the past — stainless hut for that — pale, 
calm, and heautiful : it bleeds from that black wound. 
He should be drawn, like St. Sebastian, with that arrow 
in his side. As he sent to Gay and asked his pardon, as 
he bade his step-son come and see his death, be sure he 
had forgiven Pope, when he made ready to show how a 
Christian could die. 

Pope then formed part of the Addisonian court for a short 
time, and describes himself in his letters as sitting with 
that coterie until two o'clock in the morning over punch 
and Burgundy amidst the fumes of tobacco. To use an 
expression of the present day, the "pace" of those viveurs 
of the former age was awful. Peterborough lived into the 
very jaws of death ; Godolphin laboured all day and gam- 
bled at night ; Bolingbroke,' writing to Swift, from Daw- 

1 LORD BOLINGBROKE TO THE THREE YAHOOS OF TWICKENHAM. 

" July 23, 1726. 
"Jonathan, Alexander, John, MOST excellent Triumvirs of Parnas- 
sus, — 

" Though you are probably very indifferent where I am, or what I am doing, 
yet I resolve to believe the contrary. I persuade myself that you have sent at least 
fifteen times within this fortnight to Dawley farm, and that you are extremely mor- 
tified at my long silence. To relieve you, therefore, from this great anxiety of 
mind, I can do no less than write a few lines to you ; and I please myself before- 
hand with the vast pleasure which this epistle must needs give you. That I may 
add to this pleasure, and give further proofs of my beneficent temper, I will likewise 
inform you, that I shall be in your neighbourhood again by the end of next week : 
by which time I hope that Jonathan's imagination of business will be succeeded by 
some imagination more becoming a professor of that divine science, la bagatelle. 
Adieu. Jonathan, Alexander, John, mirth be with you '." 



174 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ley, in his retirement, dating his letter at six o'clock in the 
morning, and rising, as he says, refreshed, serene, and calm, 
calls to mind the time of his London life ; when ahout that 
hour he used to be going to Taed, surfeited with pleasure, 
and jaded with business ; his head often full of schemes, 
and his heart as often full of anxiety. It was too hard, too 
coarse a life for the sensitive, sickly Pope. He was the 
only wit of the day, a friend writes to me, who was not 
fat.' Swift was fat ; Addison was fat ; Steele was fat ; 
Gray and Thomson were preposterously fat — all that fud- 
dling and punch-drinking, that club and coffee-house booz- 
ing, shortened the lives and enlarged the waistcoats of the 
men of that age. Pope withdrew in a great measure from 
this boisterous London company, and being put into an in- 
dependence by the gallant exertions of Swift* and his pri- 
vate friends, and by the enthusiastic national admiration 
which justly rewarded his great achievement of the Iliad, 
purchased that famous villa of Twickenham which his song 
and life celebrated ; duteously bringing his old parents to 
live and die there, entertaining his friends there, and mak- 
ing occasional visits to London in his little chariot, in which 
Atterbury compared him to " Homer in a nutshell." 

" Mr. Dryden was not a genteel man," Pope quaintly 
said to Spence, speaking of the manners and habits of the 
famous old patriarch of "Will's. With regard to Pope's own 
manners, we have the best contemporary authority that 



^ Prior must be excepted from this observation. " He was lank and lean." 
* Swift exerted himself, very much, in promoting the " Iliad" subscription ; and 
also introduced Pope to Harley and Bolingbroke. — Pope realised by the " Iliad'' up- 
wards of 5000Z., which he laid out partly in annuities, and partly in the purchase of 
his famous villa. Johnson remarks that " it would be hard to find a man so well 
entitled to notice by his wit, that ever delighted so much in talking of his money." 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 175 

they were singularly refined and polished. "With his ex- 
traordinary sensibility, with his known tastes, with his 
delicate frame, with his power and dread of ridicule, Pope 
could have been no other than what we call a highly-bred 
person.* His closest friends, with the exception of Swift, 
were among the delights and ornaments of the polished so- 
ciety of their age. Grarth,'' the accomplished and benevo- 
lent, whom Steele has described so charmingly, of whom 
Codrington said that his character was " all beauty," and 
whom Pope himself called the best of Christians without 
knowing it ; Arbuthnot,^ one of the wisest, wittiest, most 



" His (Pope's) voice in common conversation was so naturally musical, that I 
remember honest Tom Southefne used always to call him ' the little nightingale.' " 
— Orrery. 

^ Garth, whom Dryden calls " generous as his Muse," was a Yorkshireman. He 
graduated at Cambridge, and was made M.D. in 1691. He soon distinguished him- 
self in his profession, by his poem of the " Dispensary," and in society, and pro- 
nounced Dryden 's funeral oration. He was a strict Whig, a notable member of 
the Kit-Kat, and a friendly, convivial, able man. He was knighted by George I., 
with the Duke of Marlborough's sword. He died in 1718. 

^ " Arbuthnot was the son of an Episcopal clergyman in Scotland, and belonged 
to an ancient and distinguished Scotch family. He was educated at Aberdeen ; 
and, coming up to London — according to a Scotch practice often enough alluded to 
— to make his fortune, first made himself known by ' an examination of Dr. Wood- 
ward's account of the Deluge.' He became physician, successively, to Prince 
George of Denmark and to Queen Anne. He is usually allowed to have been the 
most learned, as well as one of the most witty and humorous members of the Scrib- 
lerus Club. The opinion entertained of him by the humourists of the day is abund- 
antly evidenced in their correspondence. When he found himself in his last ill- 
ness, he wrote thus, from his retreat at Hampstead, to Swift : 

" Hampstead, Oct. 4, 1734. 
"My dear and worthy Friend, — 

" You have no reason to put me among the rest of your forgetful friends, 
for I wrote two long letters to you, to which I never received one word of answer. 
The first was about your health ; the last I sent a great while ago, by one De la Mar. 
I can assure you with great truth that none of your friends or acquaintance has a 
more warm heart towards you than myself. 1 am going out of this troublesome 



176 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

accomplished, gentlest of mankind ; Bolingbroke, the Alci- 
biades of his age ; the generous Oxford ; the magnificent, 



world, and you, among the rest of my friends, shall have my last prayers and good 
wishes 

. ..." I came out to this place so reduced by a dropsy and an asthma that I 
could neither sleep, breathe, eat, nor move. I most earnestly desired and begged 
of God that he would take me. Contrary to my expectation, upon venturing to ride 
(which I had forborne for some years), I recovered my strength to a pretty consid- 
erable degree, slept, and had my stomach again What I did, I can assure 

you was not for life, but ease ; for I am at present in the case of a man that was 
almost in harbour, and then blown back to sea — who has a reasonable hope of going 
to a good place, and an absolute certainty of leaving a very bad one. Not that 1 
have any particular disgust at the world ; for I have as great comfort in my ovm 
family and from the kindness of my friends as any man ; but the worW, in the main, 
displeases me, and I have too true a presentiment of calamities that are to befal my 
country. However, if 1 should have the happiness to see you before I die, you will 
lind that I enjoy the comforts of life with my usual cheerfulness. I cannot imagine 
why you are frightened from a journey to England : the reasons you assign are not 
sufficient — the journey I am sure would do you good. In general, 1 recommend 
riding, of which 1 iiavc always had a good opinion, and can now confirm it from my 
own experience. 

" My family give you their love and service. The great loss I sustained in one 
of them gave me my first shock, and the trouble I have with the rest to bring them 
to a right temper to bear the loss of a father who loves them, and whom they love, is 
really a most sensible affliction to me. I am afraid, my dear friend, we shall never 
see one another more in this world. I shall, to the last moment, preserve my love 
and esteem for you, being well assured you will never leave the paths of virtue and 
honour ; for all that is in this world is not worth the least deviation from the way. 
It will be great pleasure to me to hear from you sometimes ; for none are with more 
sincerity than I am, my dear friend, your most faithful friend and humble servant." 

" Arbuthnot," Johnson says, " was a man of great comprehension, skilful in his 
profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with ancient literature, and able to 
animate his mass of knowledge by a bright and active imagination ; a scholar with 
great brilliance of wit ; a wit who, in the crowd of life, retained and discovered a 
noble ardour of religious zeal." 

Dugald Stewart has testified to Arbuthnot's ability in a department of which he 
was particularly qualified to judge : " Let me add, that, in the list of philosophical 
reformers, the authors of ' Martinus Scriblcrus' ought not to be overlooked. Their 
happy ridicule of the scholastic logic and metaphysics is universally known ; but 
few are aware of the acuteness and sagacity displayed in their allusions to some 
of the most vulnerable passages in Locke's Essay. In this part of the work it is 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 177 

the witty, the famous, and chivalrous Peterborough ; these 
were the fast and faithful friends of Pope, the most brilliant 
company of friends, let us repeat, that the world has ever 
seen. The favourite recreation of his leisure hours was the 
society of painters, whose art he practised. In his corre- 
spondence are letters between him and Jervas, whose pu- 
pil he loved to be — Richardson, a celebrated artist of his 
time, and who painted for him a portrait of his old mother, 
and for whose picture he asked and thanked Jervas in one 
of the most delightful letters that ever was penned,' — and 
the wonderful Kneller, who bragged more, spelt worse, and 
painted better than any artist of his day.'^ 



commonly understood that Arbuthnot had the principal share." — See Preliminary 
Dissertation to Enclyclopmdia Britannica, note to p. 242, and also note B. B. B. 
p. 285. 

* TO MR. RICHARDSON. 

" Twickenham, June 10, 1733. 

"As Iknow you and I mutually desire to see one another, I hope that this day 
our wishes would have met, and brought you hither. And this for the very reason, 
which possibly might hinder you coming, that my poor mother is dead. I thank 
God, her death was as easy as her life was innocent ; and as it cost her not a groan, 
or even a sigh, there is yet upon her countenance such an expression of tranquillity, 
nay, almost of pleasure, that it is even amiable to behold it. It would afford the 
finest image of a saint expired that ever painter drew ; and it would be the greatest 
obligation which even that obliging art could ever bestow on a friend, if you could 
come and sketch it for me. I am sure, if there be no very precedent obstacle, you 
will leave any common business to do this ; and I hope to see you this evening, or 
to-morrow morning as early, before this winter flower is faded. I will defer her in- 
terment till to-morrow night. I know you love me, or I could not have written this 
— ^I could not (at this time) have written at all. Adieu ! May you die as happy ! 

" Yours, &.C." 

' " Mr. Pope was with Sir Godfrey Kneller one day, when his nephew, a Guinea 
trader, came in. ' Nephew,' said Sir Godfrey, ' you have the honour of seeing the 
two greatest men in the world.' — ' I don't know how great you may be,' said the 
Guinea man, ' but I don't like your looks : I have often bought a man, much better 
than both of you together, all muscles and bones, for ten guineas.' " — Dr. Warbur- 
TON (Spence's Anecdotes). 

H 3 



178 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

It is affecting to note, through Pope's correspondence, the 
marked way in which his friends, the greatest, the most 
famous, and wittiest men of the time — generals and states- 
men, philosophers and divines, — all have a kind word, and 
a kind thought for the good simple old mother, whom Pope 
tended so affectionately. Those men would have scarcely 
valued her, but that they knew how much he loved her 
and that they pleased him by thinking of her. If his early 
letters to women are affected and insincere, whenever he 
speaks about this one, it is with a childish tenderness and 
an almost sacred simplicity. In 1713, when young Mr. 
Pope had, by a series of the most astonishing victories and 
dazzling achievements, seized the crown of poetry ; and the 
town was in an uproar of admiration, or hostility, for the 
young chief ; when Pope was issuing his famous decrees 
for the translation of the Iliad ; when Dennis and the lower 
critics were hooting and assailing him ; when Addison and 
the gentlemen of his court were sneering with sickening 
hearts at the prodigious triumphs of the young conqueror; 
when Pope, in a fever of victory, and genius, and hope, 
and anger, was struggling through the crowd of shouting 
friends and furious detractors to his temple of Fame, his 
old mother writes from the country, "My deare," says she, 
" my deare, there's Mr. Blount, of Mapel Durom, dead the 
same day that Mr. Inglefield died. Your sister is well ; 
but your brother is sick. My service to Mrs. Blount, and 
all that ask of me. I hope to hear from you, and that you 
are well, which is my daily prayer ; and this with my 
blessing." The triumph marches by, and the car of the 
young conqueror, the hero of a hundred brilliant victories 
— the fond mother sits in the quiet cottage at home, and 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 179 

says, "I send you my daily prayers, and I bless you, my 
deare." 

In our estimate of Pope's character, let us always take 
into account that constant tenderness and fidelity of affec- 
tion which pervaded and sanctified his life, and never for- 
get that maternal benediction.' It accompanied him al- 
ways : his life seems purified by those artless and heartfelt 
prayers. And he seems to have received and deserved the 
fond attachment of the other members of his family. It 
is not a little touching to read in Spence of the enthusiastic 
admiration with which his half-sister regarded him, and 
the simple anecdote by which she illustrates her love. "I 
think no man was ever so little fond of money." Mrs. 
Rackett says about her brother, " I think my brother when 
he was young read more books than any man in the world ;" 
and she falls to telling stories of his school days, and the 
manner in which his master at Twyford ill used him. "I 
don't think my brother knew what fear was," she contin- 
ues ; and the accounts of Pope's friends bear out this char- 
acter for courage. When he had exasperated the dunces, 
and threats of violence and personal assault were brought 
to him — the dauntless little champion never for one instant 
allowed fear to disturb him, or condescended to take any 
guard in his daily walks, except occasionally his faithful 
dog to bear him company. " I had rather die at once," said 
the gallant little cripple, "than live in fear of those rascals." 



* Swift's mention of him as one, 

" whose filial piety excels, 

Whatever Grecian story tells," 
is well known. And a sneer of Walpole's may be put to a better use than he ever 
intended it for, apropos of this subject. — He charitably sneers in one of his letters, 
at Spence's " fondling an old mother — in imitation of Pope !" 



180 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

As for his death, it was what the noble Arbuthnot asked 
and enjoyed for himself — a euthanasia — a beautiful end. 
A perfect benevolence, affection, serenity, hallowed the de- 
parture of that high soul. Even in the very hallucinations 
of his brain, and weaknesses of his delirium, there was 
something almost sacred. Spence describes him in his last 
days, looking up, and with a wrapt gaze as if something 
had suddenly passed before him. He said to me, "What's 
that ?" pointing into the air with a very steady regard, and 
then looked down and said with a smile of the greatest 
softness, " 'twas a vision ?" He laughed scarcely ever, 
but his companions describe his countenance as often illu- 
minated by a peculiar sweet smile. 

"When," said Spence,' the kind anecdotist whom John- 
son despised, " when I was telling Lord Bolingbroke that 
Mr. Pope, on every catching and recovery of his mind, was 
always saying something kindly of his present or absent 
friends ; and that this was so surprising, as it seemed to 
me as if humanity had outlasted understanding, Lord Bo- 
lingbroke said, ' It has so,' and then added, ' I never in my 
life knew a man who had so tender a heart for his particu- 
lar friends, or a more general friendship for mankind. I 
have known him these thirty years, and value myself more 
for that man's love than' — Here," Spence says, " St. John 
sunk his head, and lost his voice in tears." The sob which 



* Joseph Spence was the son of a clergyman, near Winchester. He was a short 
time at Eton, and afterwards became a Fellow of New College, Oxford, a clergy- 
man and professor of poetry. He was a friend of Thomson's, whose reputation he 
aided. He published an " Essay on the Odyssey" in 1726, which introduced him 
to Pope. Everybody liked him. His " Anecdotes" were placed, while still in MS., 
at the service of Johnson and also of Malone. They were published by Mr. Singer 
in 1820. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 181 

finishes the epitaph is finer than words. It is the cloak 
thrown over the father's face in the famous Grreek picture, 
which hides the grief and heightens it. 

In Johnson's "Life of Pope," you will find described 
with rather a malicious minuteness some of the personal 
habits and infirmities of the great little Pope. His body 
was crooked, he was so short that it was necessary to raise 
his chair in order to place him on a level with other peo- 
ple at table.' He was sewed up in a buckram suit every 
morning and required a nurse like a child. His contem- 
poraries reviled these misfortunes with a strange acrimony, 
and made his poor deformed person the butt for many a 
bolt of heavy wit. The facetious Mr. Dennis, in speaking 
of him, says, " If you take the first letter of Mr. Alexander 
Pope's Christian name, and the first and last letters of his 
surname, you have A. P. E." Pope catalogues, at the end 
of the Dunciad, with a rueful precision, other pretty names, 
besides Ape, which Dennis called him. That great critic 
pronounced Mr. Pope was a little ass, a fool, a coward, a 
Papist, and therefore a hater of Scripture, and so forth. It 
must be remembered that the pillory was a flourishing and 
popular institution in those days. Authors stood in it in 
the body sometimes : and dragged their enemies thither 
morally, hooted them with foul abuse, and assailed them 
with garbage of the gutter. Poor Pope's figure was an 



I He speaks of Arbuthnot's having helped him through " that long disease, my 
life." But not only was he so feeble as is implied in his use of the "buckram," but 
" it now appears," says Mr. Peter Cunningham, " from his unpublished letters, that, 
like Lord Hervey, he had recourse to ass's milk for the preservation of his health." 
It is to his lordship's use of that simple beverage that he alludes when he says — 
" Let Sporus tremble ! — A. What, that thing of silk, 
Sporus, that mere white-curd of ass's milk ?" 



182 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



easy one for those clumsy carricaturists to draw. Any 
stupid hand could draw a hunchback, and write Pope un- 
derneath. They did. A libel was published against Pope, 
with such a frontispiece. This kind of rude jesting was 
an evidence not only of an ill nature, but a dull one. 
"When a child makes a pun, or a lout breaks out into a 
laugh, it is some very obvious combination of words, or dis- 
crepancy of objects, which provokes the infantine satirist, 
or tickles the boorish wag ; and many of Pope's revilers 
laughed, not so much because they were wicked, as be- 
cause they knew no better. 

Without the utmost sensibility. Pope could not have been 
the poet he was ; and through his life, however much he 
protested that he disregarded their abuse, the coarse ridi- 
cule of his opponents stung and tore him. One of Gibber's 
pamphlets coming into Pope's hands, whilst Richardson 
the painter was with hira. Pope turned round and said, 
" These things are my diversions :" and Richardson, sitting 
by whilst Pope perused the libel, said he saw his features 
" writhing with anguish." How little human nature 
changes ! Cannot one see that little figure ? Cannot one 
fancy one is reading Horace? Cannot one fancy one is 
speaking of to-day ? 

The tastes and sensibilities of Pope, which led him to 
cultivate the society of persons of fine manners, or wit, or 
taste, or beauty, caused him to shrink equally from that 
shabby and boisterous crew which formed the rank and file 
of literature in his time : and he was as unjust to these 
men as they to him. The delicate little creature sickened 
at habits and company which were quite tolerable to ro- 
buster men : and in the famous feud between Pope and the 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 183 

Dunces, and without attributing any peculiar wrong to ei- 
ther, one can quite understand how the two parties should 
so hate each other. As I fancy, it was a sort of necessity 
that when Pope's triumph passed, Mr. Addison and his 
)nen should look rather contemptuously down on it from 
their balcony ; so it was natural for Dennis and Tibbald, 
and Webster and Gibber, and the worn and hungry press- 
men in the crowd below, to howl at him and assail him 
And Pope was more savage to Gfrub-street, than Grrub- 
street was to Pope. The thong with which he lashed them 
was dreadful ; he fired upon that howling crew such shafts 
of flame, and poison, he slew and wounded so fiercely, that 
in reading the "Dunciad" and the prose lampoons of Pope, 
one feels disposed to side against the ruthless little tyrant, 
at least to pity those wretched folks upon whom he was so 
unmerciful. It was Pope, and Swift to aid him, who es- 
tablished among us the Grrub-street tradition. He revels 
in base descriptions of poor men's want ; he gloats over 
poor Dennis's garret, and flannel night-cap, and red stock- 
ings ; he gives instructions how to find Curll's authors, the 
historian at the tallow-chandler's under the blind arch in 
Petty France, the two translators in bed together, the poet 
in the cock-loft in Budge Row, whose landlady keeps the 
ladder. It was Pope, I fear, who contributed, more than 
any man who ever lived, to depreciate the literary calling. 
It was not an unprosperous one before that time, as we 
have seen ; at least there were great prizes in the profes- 
sion which had made Addison a minister, and Prior an 
ambassador, and Steele a commissioner, and Swift all but 
a bishop. The profession of letters was ruined by that 
libel of the " Dunciad." If authors were wretched and 



184 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

poor before, if some of them lived in haylofts, of which 
their landladies kept the ladders, at least nobody came to 
disturb them in their straw ; if three of them had but one 
coat between them, the two remained invisible in the gar- 
ret, the third, at any rate, appeared decently at the coffee- 
house, and paid his twopence like a gentleman. It was 
Pope that dragged into light all this poverty and mean- 
ness, and held up those wretched shifts and rags to public 
ridicule. It was Pope that has made generations of the 
reading world (delighted with the mischief, as who would 
not be that reads it ?) believe that author and wretch, au- 
thor and rags, author and dirt, author and drink, gin, cow- 
heel, tripe, poverty, duns, bailiffs, squalling children, and 
clamorous landladies, were always associated together. 
The condition of authorship began to fall from the days of 
the " Dunciad:" and I believe in my heart that much of 
that obloquy which has since pursued our calling was oc- 
casioned by Pope's libels and wicked wit. Everybody read 
those. Everybody was familiarised with the idea of the 
poor devil author. The manner is so captivating, that 
young authors practise it, and begin their career with satire. 
It is so easy to write, and so pleasant to read ! to fire a shot 
that makes a giant wince, perhaps ; and fancy one's self 
his conqueror. It is easy to shoot — but not as Pope did — 
the shafts of his satire rise sublimely : no poet's verse ever 
mounted higher than that wonderful flight with which the 
" Dunciad" concludes :' — 

" She comes, she comes ! the sable throne behold ' 
Of night primeval and of Chaos old ; 



' " He (Johnson) repeated to us, in his forcible melodious manner, the concluding 
lines of the ' Dunciad.' " — Boswell. 



PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 185 

Before her, Fancy's gilded clouds decay, 
And all its varying rainbows die away ; 
Wit shoots in vain its momentary fires, 
The meteor drops, and in a flash expires. 
As, one by one, at dread Medea's strain 
The sick'ning stars fade off the ethereal plain ; 
As Argus' eye, by Hermes' wand oppress'd. 
Closed one by one to everlasting rest ; — 
Thus, at her fell approach and secret might, 
Art after Art goes out, and all is night. 
See skulking Faith to her old cavern fled. 
Mountains of casuistry heaped o'er her head ; 
Philosophy that leaned on Heaven before, 
Shrinks to her second cause and is no more. 
Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires, 
And unawares Morality expires. 
No public flame, nor private, dares to shine, 
Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine. 
Lo ! thy dread empire. Chaos, is restored. 
Light dies before thy uncreating word ; 
Thy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtain fall. 
And universal darkness buries all."' 

In these astonishing lines Pope reaches, I think, to the 
very greatest height which his sublime art has attained, 
and shows himself the equal of all poets of all times. It 
is the brightest ardour, the loftiest assertion of truth, the 
most generous wisdom, illustrated by the noblest poetic 
figure, and spoken in words the aptest, grandest, and most 
harmonious. It is heroic courage speaking: a splendid 
declaration of righteous wrath and war. It is the gage 
flung down, and the silver trumpet ringing defiance to 
falsehood and tyranny, deceit, dulness, superstition. It is 
Truth, the champion, shining and intrepid, and fronting 



' " Mr. Langton informed me that he once related to Johnson (on the authority 
of Spence), that Pope himself admired these lines so much that when he repeated 
them his voice faltered. ' And well it might, sir,' said Johnson, ' for they are noble 
lines.' " — J. BoswELL, junior. 



186 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

the great world-tyrant with armies of slaves at his back. 
It is a wonderful and victorious single combat, in that great 
battle which has always been waging since society began. 
In speaking of a work of consummate art one does not 
try to show what it is, for that were vain ; but what it is 
like, and what are the sensations produced in the mind of 
him who views it. And in considering Pope's admirable 
career, I am forced into similitudes drawn from other cour- 
age and greatness, and into comparing him with those who 
achieved triumphs in actual war. I think of the works of 
young Pope as I do of the actions of young Bonaparte or 
young Nelson. In their common life you will find frailties 
and meannesses, as great as the vices and follies of the 
meanest men. But in the presence of the great occasion, 
the great soul flashes out, and conquers transcendent. In 
thinking of the splendour of Pope's young victories, of his 
merit, unequalled as his renown, I hail and salute the 
achieving genius, and do homage to the pen of a Hero. 



LECTURE THE FIFTH. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 

I SUPPOSE as long as novels last and authors aim at in- 
teresting their public, there must always be in the story a 
virtuous and gallant hero, a wicked monster his opposite, 
and a pretty girl who finds a champion ; bravery and vir- 
tue conquer beauty : and vice, after seeming to triumph 
through a certain number of pages, is sure to be discom- 
fited in the last volume, when justice overtakes him and 
honest folks come by their own. There never was perhaps 
a greatly popular story but this simple plot was carried 
through it : mere satiric wit is addressed to a class of read- 
ers and thinkers quite different to those simple souls who 
laugh and weep over the novel. I fancy very few ladies 
indeed, for instance, could be brought to like " GruUiver" 
heartily, and (putting the coarseness and difference of 
manners out of the question) to relish the wonderful satire 
of " Jonathan Wild." In that strange apologue, the au- 
thor takes for a hero the greatest rascal, coward, traitor, 
tyrant, hypocrite, that his wit and experience, both large 
in this matter, could enable him to devise or depict ; he 
accompanies this villain through all the actions of his life, 
with a grinning deference and a wonderful mock respect : 
and does not leave him, till he is dangling at the gallows, 
when the satirist makes him a low bow and wishes the 
scoundrel good-day. 



188 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

It was not by satire of this sort, or by scorn and con- 
tempt, that Hogarth achieved his vast popularity and ac- 
quired his reputation.' His art is quite simple,'' he speaks 



• Coleridge speaks of the " beautiful female faces" in Hogarth's pictures, " in 
whom," he says, " the satirist never extinguished that love of beauty which be- 
longed to him as a poet." — The Friend. 

* " I was pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who, being asked which book he 
esteemed most in his library, answered, ' Shakspeare :' being asked which he es- 
teemed next best, replied, ' Hogarth.' His graphic representations are indeed books : 
they have the teeming, fruitful, suggestive meaning of words. Other pictures we 
look at — his prints we read 

" The quantity of thought which Hogarth crowds into every picture would almost 
unvulgarise every subject which he might choose 

" I say not that all the ridiculous subjects of Hogarth have necessarily something 
in them to make us like them ; some are indifferent to us, some in their nature re- 
pulsive, and only made interesting by the wonderful skill and truth to nature in the 
painter ; but I contend that there is in most of them that sprinkling of the better 
nature, which, like holy water, chases away and disperses the contagion of the bad. 
They have this in them, besides, that they bring us acquainted with the every-day 
human face, — they give us skill to detect those gradations of sense and virtue 
(which escape the careless or fastidious observer) in the circumstances of the world 
about us ; and prevent that disgust at common life, that tcBdmni quotidianaruni for- 
marum, which an unrestricted passion for ideal forms and beauties is in danger of 
producing. In this, as in many other things, they are analogous to the best novels 
of Smollett and Fielding." — Charles Lamb. 

" It has been observed that Hogarth's pictures are exceedingly unlike any other 
representations of the same kind of subjects — that they form a class, and have a 
character, peculiar to themselves. It may be worth while to consider in what this 
general distinction consists. 

" In the first place, they are, in the strictest sense, historical pictures ; and if 
what Fielding says be true, that his novel of ' Tom Jones' ought to be regarded as 
an epic prose-poem, because it contained a regular development of fable, manners, 
character, and passion, the compositions of Hogarth will, in like manner, be found 
to have a higher claim to the title of epic pictures than many which have of late 
arrogated that denomination to themselves. When we say that Hogarth treated his 
subjects historically, we mean that his works represent the manners and humours 
of mankind in action, and their characters by varied expression. Everything in his 
pictures has life and motion in it. Not only does the business of the scene never 
stand still, but every feature and muscle is put into full play ; the exact feeling of 
the moment is brought out, and carried to its utmost height, and then instantly 
seized and stamped on the canvass for ever. The expression is always taken en 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 189 

popular parables to interest simple hearts, and to inspire 
them with pleasure or pity or warning and terror. Not 
one of his tales but is as easy as " Groody Two Shoes ;" it 
is the moral of Tommy was a naughty boy and the master 
flogged him, and Jacky was a good boy and had plum 
cake, which pervades the whole works of the homely and 
famous English moralist. And if the moral is written in 
rather too large letters after the fable, we must remember 
how simple the scholars and schoolmaster both were, and 
like neither the less because they are so artless and honest. 
" It was a maxim of Dr. Harrison's," Fielding says in 
"Amelia," speaking of the benevolent divine and philoso- 
pher who represents the good principle in that novel — "that 
no man can descend below himself, in doing any act which 
may contribute to protect an innocent person, or to bring 
a rogue to the gallows.''^ The moralists of that age had 
no compunction you see ; they had not begun to be scep- 
tical about the theory of punishment, and thought that the 
hanging of a thief was a spectacle for edification. Masters 
sent their apprentices, fathers took their children, to see 
Jack Sheppard or Jonathan Wild hanged, and it was as un- 
doubting subscribers to this moral law, that Fielding wrote 
and Hogarth painted. Except in one instance, where in the 
mad-house scene in the " Rake's Progress," the girl whom 



passant, in a state of progress or change, and, as it were, at the salient point. . . . 
His figures are not like the back-ground on which they are painted : even the pic- 
tures on the wall have a peculiar look of their own. Again, with the rapidity, va- 
riety, and scope of history, Hogarth's heads have all the reality and correctness of 
portraits. He gives the extremes of character and expression, but he gives them 
with perfect truth and accuracy. This is, in fact, what distinguishes his composi- 
tions from all others of the same kind, that they are equally remote from caricature, 

and from mere still life Hi« faces go to the very verge of caricature, and 

yet never (we believe in any single instance) go beyond it." — Hazlitt. 



190 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

he has ruined is represented as still tending and weeping 
over him in his insanity, a glimpse of pity for his rogues 
never seems to enter honest Hogarth's mind. There's not 
the slightest doubt in the breast of the jolly Draco. 

The famous set of pictures called " Marriage a la Mode," 
and which are exhibited at Marlborough House, in London, 
contains the most important and highly wrought of the 
Hogarth comedies. The care and method with which the 
moral grounds of these pictures are laid is as remarkable 
as the wit and skill of the observing and dexterous artist. 
He has to describe the negotiations for a marriage pending 
between the daughter of a rich citizen Alderman and young 
Lord Viscount Squanderfield, the dissipated son of a gouty 
old Earl. Pride and pomposity appear in every accessory 
surrounding the Earl. He sits in gold lace and velvet — 
as how should such an Earl wear anything but velvet and 
gold lace ? His coronet is everywhere : on his footstool on 
which reposes one gouty toe turned out ; on the sconces 
and looking-glasses ; on the dogs ; on his lordship's very 
crutches ; on his great chair of state and the great balda- 
quin behind him ; under which he sits pointing majestical- 
ly to his pedigree, which shows that his race is sprung from 
the loins of William the Conquerer, and confronting the old 
Alderman from the City, who has mounted his sword for the 
occasion, and wears his Alderman's chain, and has brought 
a bag full of money, mortgage deeds, and thousand pound 
notes, for the arrangement of the transaction pending be- 
tween them. Whilst the steward (a methodist, therefore 
a hypocrite and cheat, for Hogarth scorned a papist and a 
dissenter,) is negotiating between the old couple, their chil- 
dren sit together, united but apart. My lord is admiring 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 191 



himself in the glass, while his bride is twiddling her mar- 
riage ring on her pocket handkerchief; and listening with 
rueful countenance to Counsellor Silvertongue, who has 
been drawing the settlements. The girl is pretty, but the 
painter, with a curious watchfulness, has taken care to give 
her a likeness to her father, as in the young Viscount's face 
you see a resemblance to the Earl, his noble sire. The 
sense of the coronet pervades the picture, as it is supposed 
to do the mind of its wearer. The pictures round the room 
are sly hints indicating the situation of the parties about 
to marry. A martyr is led to the fire; Andromeda is offer- 
ed to sacrifice ; Judith is going to slay Holofernes. There 
is the ancestor of the house (in the picture it is the Earl 
himself as a young man), with a comet over his head, in- 
dicating that the career of the family is to be brilliant and 
brief. In the second picture, the old Lord must be dead, 
for Madam has now the Countess's coronet over her bed 
and toilet-glass, and sits listening to that dangerous Coun- 
sellor Silvertongue, whose portrait now actually hangs up 
in her room, whilst the counsellor takes his ease on the sofa 
by her side, evidently the familiar of the house and the 
confidant of the mistress. My lord takes his pleasure else- 
where than at home, whither he returns jaded and tipsy 
from the Rose, to find his wife yawning in her drawing- 
room, her whist-party over, and the daylight streaming in ; 
or he amuses himself with the very worst company abroad, 
whilst his wife sits at home listening to foreign singers, or 
wastes her money at auctions, or, worse still, seeks amuse- 
ment at masquerades. The dismal end is known. My 
lord draws upon the counsellor, who kills him, and is ap- 
prehended whilst endeavouring to escape. My lady goes 



192 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

back perforce to the Alderman in the City, and faints upon 
reading Counsellor Silvertongue's dying speech at Tyburn, 
where the counsellor has been executed for sending his lord- 
ship out of the world. Moral : — Don't listen to evil silver- 
tongued counsellors : don't marry a man for his rank, or a 
woman for her money : don't frequent foolish auctions and 
masquerade balls unknown to your husband : don't have 
wicked companions abroad and neglect your wife, otherwise 
you will be run through the body, and ruin will ensue, and 
disgrace, and Tyburn. The people are all naughty, and 
Bogey carries them all off. 

In the " Rake's Progress," a loose life is ended by a sim- 
ilar sad catastrophe. It is the spendthrift coming into pos- 
session of the wealth of the paternal miser ; the prodigal 
surrounded by flatterers, and wasting his substance on the 
very worst company ; the bailiffs, the gambling-house, and 
Bedlam for an end. In the famous story of Industry and 
Idleness, the moral is pointed in a manner similarly clear. 
Fair-haired Frank Groodchild smiles at his work, whilst 
naughty Tom Idle snores over his loom. Frank reads the 
edifying ballads of Whittington and the London 'Prentice ; 
whilst that reprobate Tom Idle prefers Moll Flanders, and 
drinks hugely of beer, Frank goes to church of a Sunday, 
and warbles hymns from the gallery ; while Tom lies on a 
tomb -stone outside playing at halfpenny - under - the - hat, 
with street blackguards, and deservedly caned by the bea- 
dle, Frank is made overseer of the business, whilst Tom is 
sent to sea. Frank is taken into partnership and marries 
his master's daughter, sends out broken victuals to the poor, 
and listens in his night-cap and gown, with the lovely Mrs. 
Groodchild by his side, to the nuptial music of the City 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 193 

bands and the marrow-bones and cleavers ; whilst idle Tom, 
returned from sea, shudders in a garret lest the officers are 
coming to take him for picking pockets. The Worshipful 
Francis Goodchild, Esq., becomes Sheriff of London, and 
partakes of the most splendid dinners which money can 
purchase or Alderman devour ; whilst poor Tom is taken 
up in a night cellar, with that one-eyed and disreputable 
accomplice who first taught him to play chuck-farthing on 
a Sunday. What happens next ? Tom is brought up be- 
fore the justice of his country, in the person of Mr. Alder- 
man Groodchild, who weeps as he recognises his old broth- 
er 'prentice, as Tom's one-eyed friend peaches on him, and 
the clerk makes out the poor rogue's ticket for Newgate. 
Then the end comes. Tom goes to Tyburn in a cart with 
a coffin in it ; whilst the Right Honourable Francis Grood- 
child, Lord Mayor of London, proceeds to his Mansion 
House in his gilt coach, with four footmen and a sword- 
bearer ; whilst the Companies of London march in the 
august procession ; whilst the trainbands of the City fire 
their pieces and get drunk in his honour ; and oh ! crown- 
ing delight and glory of all, whilst his Majesty the King 
looks out from his royal balcony, with his ribbon on his 
breast, and his Q,ueen and his star by his side, at the cor- 
ner house of St. Paul's Church-yard, where the toy-shop is 
now. 

How the times have changed ! The new Post-office now 
not disadvantageously occupies that spot where the scaf- 
folding is in the picture, where the tipsy trainband-man 
is lurching against the post, with his wig over one eye, and 
the 'prentice-boy is trying to kiss the pretty girl in the gal- 
lery. Past away 'prentice boy and pretty girl ! Past away 

I 



194 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

tipsy trainband-man with wig and bandolier ! On the spot 
where Tom Idle (for whom I have an unaffected pity) made 
his exit from this wicked world, and where you see the 
hangman smoking his pipe as he reclines on the gibbet 
and views the hills of Harrow or Hampstead beyond — a 
splendid marble arch, a vast and modern city — clean, airy, 
painted drab, populous with nursery-maids and children, 
the abodes of wealth and comfort — the elegant, the pros- 
perous, the polite Tyburnia rises, the most respectable dis- 
trict in the habitable globe ! 

In that last plate of the London Apprentices, in which 
the apotheosis of the Right Honourable Francis Groodchild 
is drawn, a ragged fellow is represented in the corner of 
the simple kindly piece, offering for sale a broadside, pur- 
porting to contain an account of the appearance of the ghost 
of Tom Idle, executed at Tyburn. Could Tom's ghost have 
made its appearance in 1800, and not in 1747, what changes 
would have been remarked by that astonished escaped crim- 
inal ! Over that road which the hangman used to travel 
constantly, and the Oxford stage twice a week, go ten thou- 
sand carriages every day : over yonder road, by which Dick 
Turpin fled to Windsor, and Squire Western journeyed into 
town, when he came to take up his quarters at the Hercu- 
les Pillars on the outskirts of London, what a rush of civil- 
isation and order flows now ! What armies of gentlemen 
with umbrellas march to banks, and chambers, and count- 
ing-houses ! What regiments of nursery-maids and pretty 
infantry ; what peaceful processions of policemen, what 
light broughams and what gay carriages, what swarms of 
busy apprentices and artificers, riding on omnibus-roofs, 
pass daily and hourly ! Tom Idle's times are quite changed : 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 196 

many of the institutions gone into disuse which were ad- 
mired in his day. There's more pity and kindness and a 
better chance for poor Tom's successors now than at that 
simpler period when Fielding hanged him and Hogarth drew 
him. 

To the student of history, these admirable works must 
be invaluable, as they give us the most complete and truth- 
ful picture of the manners, and even the thoughts, of the 
past century. We look, and see pass before us the England 
of a hundred years ago — the peer in his drawing-room, the 
lady of fashion in her apartment, foreign singers surround- 
ing her, and the chamber filled with gew-gaws in the mode 
of that day ; the church, with its quaint florid architecture 
and singing congregation ; the parson with his great wig, 
and the beadle with his cane : all these are represented be- 
fore us, and we are sure of the truth of the portrait. We 
see how the Lord Mayor dines in state ; how the prodigal 
drinks and sports at the bagnio ; how the poor girl beats 
hemp in Bridewell ; how the thief divides his booty and 
drinks his punch at the night-cellar, and how he finishes 
his career at the gibbet. We may depend upon the perfect 
accuracy of these strange and varied portraits of the bygone 
generation : we see one of Walpole's members of Parliament 
cheered after his election, and the lieges celebrating the 
event, and drinking confusion to the Pretender : we see 
the grenadiers and trainbands of the City marching out to 
meet the enemy ; and have before us, with sword and fire- 
lock, and white Hanoverian horse embroidered on the cap, 
the very figures of the men who ran away with Johnny 
Cope, and who conquered at Culloden. The Yorkshire 
waggon rolls into the inn-yard ; the country parson, in his 



196 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

jack-boots, and his bands and short cassock, comes trotting 
into town, and we fancy it is Parson Adams, with his ser- 
mons in his pocket. The Salisbury fly sets forth from the 
old Angel — you see the passengers entering the great heavy 
vehicle, up the wooden steps, their hats tied down with 
handkerchiefs over their faces, and under their arms, sword, 
hanger, and case-bottle ; the landlady — apoplectic with the 
liquors in her own bar — is tugging at the bell ; the hunch- 
backed postilion — he may have ridden the leaders to Hum- 
phry Clinker — is begging a gratuity ; the miser is grum- 
bling at the bill ; Jack of the Centurion lies on the top of 
the clumsy vehicle, with a soldier by his side — it may be 
SmoUet's Jack Hatchway — it has a likeness to Lismahago. 
You see the suburban fair and the strolling company of act- 
ors ; the pretty milkmaid singing under the windows of 
the enraged French musician — it is such a girl as Steele 
charmingly described in the " Gruardian," a few years be- 
fore this date, singing under Mr. Ironside's window in Shire- 
lane, her pleasant carol of a May morning. You see noble- 
men and blacklegs bawling and betting in the Cockpit ; 
you see Grarrick as he was arrayed in King Richard; 
Macheath and Polly in the dresses which they wore when 
they charmed our ancestors, and when noblemen in blue 
ribbons sat on the stage and listened to their delightful 
music. You see the ragged French soldiery, in their white 
coats and cockades, at Calais Gate — they are of the regi- 
ment, very likely, which friend Roderick Random joined 
before he was rescued by his preserver Monsieur de Strap, 
with whom he fought on the famous day of Dettingen. 
You see the judges on the bench ; the audience laughing 
in the pit ; the student in the Oxford theatre ; the citizen 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 197 

on his country walk ; you see Broughton the hoxer, Sarah 
Malcolm the murderess, Simon Lovat the traitor, John 
Wilkes the demagogue, leering at you with that squint 
which has become historical, and with that face which, 
ugly as it was, he said he could make as captivating to 
woman as the countenance of the handsomest beau in 
town. All these sights and people are with you. After 
looking in the " Rake's Progress" at Hogarth's picture of 
St. James's Palace-gate, you may people the street, but 
little altered within these hundred years, with the gilded 
carriages and thronging chairmen that bore the courtiers 
your ancestors to Q,ueen Caroline's drawing-room more than 
a hundred years ago. 

What manner of man^ was he who executed these por- 

^ Hogarth (whose family name was Hogart) was the grandson of a Westmoreland 
yeoman. His father came to London, and was an author and schoolmaster. Will- 
iam was bom in 1698 (according to the most probable conjecture), in the parish of 
St. Martin, Ludgate. He was early apprenticed to an engraver of arms on plate. 
The following touches are from his Anecdotes of Himself. (Edition of 1833.) 

" As I had naturally a good eye, and a fondness for drawing, shows of all sorts 
gave me uncommon pleasure when an infant ; and mimicry, common to all children, 
was remarkable in me. An early access to a neighbouring painter drew my atten- 
tion from play ; and I was, at every possible opportunity, employed in making draw- 
ings. I picked up an acquaintance of the same turn, and soon learnt to draw the 
alphabet with great correctness. My exercises, when at school, were more remark- 
able for the ornaments which adorned them, than for the exercise itself. In the 
former, I soon found that blockheads with better memories could much surpass me ; 
Dut for the latter I was particularly distinguished 

" I thought it still more unlikely that by pursuing the common method, and copy- 
ing old drawings, I could ever attain the power of making new designs, which was 
my first and greatest ambition. I therefore endeavoured to habituate myself to the 
exercise of a sort of technical memory ; and by repeating in my own mind the parts 
of which objects were composed, I could by degrees combine and put them down 
with my pencil. Thus, with all the drawbacks which resulted from the circum- 
stances I have mentioned, I had one material advantage over my competitors, viz., 
the early habit I thus acquired of retainmg in my mind's eye, without coldly copy- 
ing it on the spot, whatever I intended to imitate. 



198 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

traits — so various, so faithful, and so admirable? In the 
London National G-allery most of us have seen the best and 

" The instant I became master of my own time, I determined to qualify myself 
for engraving on copper. In this I readily got employment ; and frontispieces to 
books, such as prints to ' Hudibras,' in twelves, &c. soon brought me into the way. 
But the tribe of booksellers remained as my father had left them .... which put 
me upon publishing on my own account. But here again I had to encounter a 
monopoly of printsellers, equally mean and destructive to the ingenious; for the 
first plate I published, called ' The Taste of the Town,' in which the reigning follies 
were lashed, had no sooner begun to take a run, than I found copies of it in the 
print-shops, vending at half-price, while the original prints were returned to me 
again, eind I was thus obliged to sell the plate for whatever these pirates pleased to 
give me, as there was no place of sale but at their shops. Owing to this, and other 
circumstances, by engraving, until I was near thirty, I could do little more than 
maintain myself; but even then, I was a punctual paymaster. 

" I then married, and — 

[But William is going too fast here. He made ' a stolen union' on March 23, 
1729, with Jane, daughter of Sir James Thomhill, serjeant-painter. For some 
time Sir James kept his heart and his purse-strings close, but ' soon after became 
both reconciled and generous to the young couple.' — HogartVs Works, by Nichols 
and Steevens, vol. i. p. 44.] 

" — commenced painter of small Conversation Pieces, from twelve to fifteen inches 
high. This being a novelty, succeeded for a few years." 

(About this time Hogarth had summer-lodgings at South Lambeth, and did all 
kinds of work, " embellishing" the " Spring Gardens" at " Vauxhall," and the like. 
In 1731, he published a satirical plate against Pope, founded on the well-known im- 
putation against him of his having satirised the Duke of Chandos under the name 
of Timon, in his poem on Taste. The plate represented a view of Burlington 
House with Pope whitewashing it, and bespattering the Duke of Chandos's coach. 
Pope made no retort, and has never mentioned Hogarth.) 

" Before I had done anything of much consequence in this walk, I entertained 
some hopes of succeeding in what the puffers in books call The Great Style of His- 
tory Painting ; so that without having had a stroke of this grand business before, I 
quitted small portraits and familiar conversations, and with a smile at my own te- 
merity, commenced history-painter, and on a great staircase at St. Bartholomew's 
Hospital painted two Scripture stories, the 'Pool of Bcthesda' and the ' Good Sa- 
maritan,' with features seven feet high. . . . But as religion, the great promoter of 
this style in other countries, rejected it in England, I was unwilling to sink into a 
portrait manufacturer ; and still ambitious of being singular, dropped all expecta- 
tions of advantage from that source, and returned to the pursuit of my former deal- 
ings with the public at large. 

" As to portrait-painting, the chief branch of the art by which a painter can pro- 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 199 

most carefully finished series of his comic paintings, and 
the portrait of his own honest face, of which the bright blue 

cure himself a tolerable livelihood, and the only one by which a lover of money can 
get a fortune ; a man of very moderate talents may have great success in it, as the 
artifice and address of a mercer is infinitely more useful than the abilities of a 
painter. By the manner in which the present race of professors in England con- 
duct it, that also becomes still life." 

******* 

" By this inundation of folly and puff" (he has been speaking of the success of Van- 
loo, who came over here in 1737), " I must confess I was much disgusted, and determ- 
ined to try if by any means I could stem the torrent, and by opposing end it. I 
laughed at the pretensions of these quacks in colouring, ridiculed their productions 
as feeble and contemptible, and asserted that it required neither taste nor talents 
to excel their most popular performances. This interference excited much enmity, 
because, as my opponents told me, my studies were in another way. You talk, 
added they, with ineffable contempt of portrait-painting ; if it is so easy a task, why 
do not you convince the world by painting a portrait yourself? Provoked at this 
language, I one day, at the Academy in St. Martin's Lane, put the following ques- 
tion : Supposing any man, at this time, were to paint a portrait as well as Vandyke, 
would it be seen or acknowledged, and could the artist enjoy the benefit or acquire 
the reputation due to his performance ? 

" They asked me in reply. If I could paint one as well ? and I frankly answered, 
I believed I could 

" Of the mighty talents said to be requisite for portrait-painting, I had not the most 
exalted opinion." 

Let us now hear him on the question of the Academy : — 

" To pester the three great estates of the empire, about twenty or thirty students 
drawing after a man or a horse, appears, as must be acknowledged, foolish enough : 
but the real motive is, that a few bustling chaiacters, who have access to people of 
rank, think they can thus get a superiority over their brethren, be appointed to 
place, and have salaries as in France, for telling a lad when a leg or an arm is too 
long or too short. 

" France, ever aping the magnificence of other nations, has in its turn assumed a 
foppish kind of splendour sufficient to dazzle the eyes of the neighbouring states, 
and draw vast sums of money from this country 

" To return to our Royal Academy ; I am told that one of their leading objects will 
be, sending young men abroad to study the antique statues, for such kind of studies 
may sometimes improve an exalted genius, but they will not create it ; and what- 
ever has been the cause, this same travelling to Italy has, in several instances that 
I have seen, reduced the student from nature, and led him to paint marble figures, 
in which be has availed himself of the great works of antiquity, as a coward does 
when he puts on the armour of an Alexander ; for, with similar pretensions and 



200 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

eyes shine out from the canvass and give you an idea of 
that keen and brave look with which William Hogarth re- 
garded the world. No man was ever less of a hero ; you 
see him before you, and can fancy what he was — a jovial, 

similar vanity, the painter supposes he shall be adored as a second Raphael Ur- 
bino." 

We must now hear him on his " Sigismunda :" — 

" As the most violent and virulent abuse thrown on ' Sigismunda' was from a set 
of miscreants, with whom I am proud of having been ever at war, I mean the ex- 
pounders of the mysteries of old pictures, I have been sometimes told they were be- 
neath my notice. This is true of them individually, but as they have access to 
people of rank, who seem as happy in being cheated as these merchants are in cheat- 
ing them, they have a power of doing much mischief to a modem artist. However 
mean the vendor of poisons the mineral is destructive : — to me its operation was 
troublesome enough. Ill nature spread so fast that now was the time for every lit- 
tle dog in the profession to bark !" 

Next comes a characteristic account of his controversy with Wilkes and 
Churchill. 

" The stagnation rendered it necessary that I should do some timed thing, to re- 
cover my lost time, and stop a gap in my income. This drew forth my print of 
' The Times,' a subject which tended to the restoration of peace and unanimity, 
and put the opposers of these humane objects in a light which gave great offence 
to those who were trying to foment disaffection in the minds of the populace. One 
of the most notorious of them, till now my friend and flatterer, attacked me in a 
' North Briton,' in so infamous and malign a style, that he himself, when pushed 
even by his best friends, was driven to so poor an excuse as to say he was drank 
when he wrote it 

" This renowned patriot's portrait, drawn like as I could as to features, and 
marked with some indications of his mind, fully answered my purpose. The ridic- 
ulous was apparent to every eye ! A Brutus ! A saviour of his country with such 
an aspect — was so arrant a farce, that though it gave rise to much laughter in the 
lookers-on, galled both him and his adherents to the bone. . . . 

" Churchill, Wilkes's toad-echo, put the ' North Briton' into verse,' in an Epistle 
to Hogarth ; but as the abuse was precisely the same, except a little poetical 
heightening, which goes for nothing, it made no impression However, hav- 
ing an old plate by me, with some parts ready, such as the back-ground and a dog, 
I began to consider how I could turn so much work laid aside to some account, and 
so patched up a print of Master Churchill in the character of a Bear. The pleasure 
and [)ecnniary advantage which I derived from these two engravings, together with 
occasionally riiling on horseback, restored me to as much health as can be expected 
ul my time of life." 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 201 

honest, London citizen, stout and sturdy ; a hearty, plain- 
spoken man,' loving his laugh, his friends, his glass, his 
roast-beef of Old England, and having a proper bourgeois 
scorn for French frogs, for mounseers, and wooden shoes 
in general, for foreign fiddlers, foreign singers, and, above 
all, for foreign painters, whom he held in the most amusing 
contempt. 

It must have been great fun to hear him rage against 
Correggio and the Carracci ; to watch him thump the ta- 
ble and snap his fingers and say, " Historical painters be 
hanged ; here's the man that will paint against any of them 
for a hundred pounds. Correggio's ' Sigismunda !' Look 
at Bill Hogarth's ' Sigismunda ;' look at my altar-piece at 
St. Mary Redcliffe, Bristol; look at my 'Paul before Fe- 
lix,' and see whether I'm not as good as the best of 
them.'" 



' " It happened in the early part of Hogarth's life, that a nobleman who was un- 
commonly ugly and deformed came to sit to him for his picture. It was executed 
with a skill that did honour to the artist's abilities ; but the likeness was rigidly 
observed, without even the necessary attention to compliment or flattery. The 
peer, disgusted at this counterpart of himself, never once thought of paying for a re- 
flection that would only disgust him with its deformities. Some time was suffered 
to elapse before the artist applied for his money ; but afterwards many applications 
were made by him (who had then no need of a banker) for payment, without suc- 
cess. The painter, however, at last hit upon an expedient It was couched 

in the following card : — 

" ' Mr. Hogarth's dutiful respects to Lord . Finding that he does not mean 

to have the picture which was drawn for him, is informed again of Mr. Hogarth's 
necessity for the money. If, therefore, his Lordship does not send for it in three 
days, it will be disposed of, with the addition of a tail, and some other little append- 
ages, to Mr. Hare, the famous wild beast man ; Mr. Hogarth having given that gen- 
tleman a conditional promise of it, for an exhibition-picture, on his Lordship's re- 
fusal.' 

" This intimation had the desired effect." — Works by Nichols u7id Steevens, vol- 
i. p. 25. 

' Garrick hmiself was not more ductile to flatteiy. A word in favour of ' Sigis- 

12 



202 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Posterity has not quite confirmed honest Hogarth's opin- 
ion about his talents for the sublime. Although Swift 
could not see the difference between tweedle-dee and twee- 
dle-dum, posterity has not shared the Dean's contempt for 
Handel ; the world has discovered a difference between 
tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, and given a hearty applause 
and admiration to Hogarth, too, but not exactly as a paint- 
er of scriptural subjects, or as a rival of Correggio. It 
does not take away from one's liking for the man, or from 
the moral of his story, or the humour of it, from one's ad- 
miration for the prodigious merit of his performances, to 
remember that he persisted to the last in believing that 
the world was in a conspiracy against him with respect to 
his talents as an historical painter, and that a set of mis- 
creants, as he called them, were employed to run his genius 
down. They say it was Liston's firm belief, that he was 
a great and neglected tragic actor ; they say that every one 
of us believes in his heart, or would like to have others be- 
lieve, that he is something which he is not. One of the 



munda' might have commanded a proof-print or forced an original print out of our 
artist's hands." .... 

" The following authenticated story of our artist (furnished by the late Mr. Bel- 
chier, F.R.S., a surgeon of eminence) will also serve to show how much more easy 
it is to detect ill-placed or hyperbolical adulation respecting others, than when ap- 
plied to ourselves. Hogarth, being at dinner with the great Cheselden and some 
other company, was told that Mr. John Freke, surgeon of St. Bartholomew's Hos- 
pital, a few evenings before at Dick's Coffee-house, had asserted that Greene was 
as eminent in composition as Handel. ' That fellow Freke,' replied Hogarth, 'is 
always shooting his bolt absurdly, one way or another. Handel is a giant in mu- 
sic ; Greene only a light Florimel kind of a composer.' ' Ay,' says our artist's in- 
formant, ' but at the same time Mr. Freke declared you were as good a portrait- 
painter as Vandyck.' ' There he was right,' adds Hogarth, ' and so, by G , I am, 

give nie my time and let me choose my subject." — Works by Nichols and Steevens, 
vol. i. pp. 230, 237. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND l^IELDING. 203 

most notorious of the " miscreants," Hogarth says, was 
Wilkes, who assailed him in the " North Briton ;" the other 
was Churchill, who put the " North Briton" attack into 
heroic verse, and published his " Epistle to Hogarth." 
Hogarth replied by that caricature of Wilkes, in which 
the patriot still figures before us, with his Satanic grin and 
squint, and by a caricature of Churchill, in which he is 
represented as a bear with a staff, on which, lie the first, 
lie the second, lie the tenth, is engraved in unmistake- 
able letters. There is very little mistake about honest 
Hogarth's satire : if he has to paint a man with his throat 
cut, he draws him with his head almost off; and he tried 
to do the same for his enemies in this little controversy. 
"Having an old plate by me," says he, "with some parts 
ready, such as the background, and a dog, I began to con- 
sider how I could turn so much work laid aside to some 
account, and so patched up a print of Master Churchill, in 
the character of a bear; the pleasure and pecuniary ad- 
vantage which I derived from these two engravings, to- 
gether with occasionally riding on horseback, restored me 
to as much health as I can expect at my time of life." 

And so he concludes his queer little book of Anecdotes, 
" I have gone through the circumstances of a life which 
till lately passed pretty much to my own satisfaction, and 
I hope in no respect injurious to any other man. This I 
may safely assert, that I have done my best to make those 
about me tolerably happy, and my greatest enemy cannot 
say I ever did an intentional injury. What may follow, 
Grod knows." 

A queer account still exists of a holiday jaunt taken by 
Hogarth and four friends of his, who set out, like the re- 



204 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

doubted Mr. Pickwick and his companions, but just a 
hundred years before those heroes ; and made an excursion 
to Grravesend, Rochester, Sheerness, and adjacent places.* 
One of the gentlemen noted down the proceedings of the 
journey, for which Hogarth and a brother artist made 
drawings. The book is chiefly curious at this moment 
from showing the citizen life of those days, and the rough, 
jolly style of merriment, not of the five companions mere- 
ly, but of thousands of jolly fellows of their time. Ho- 
garth and his friends quitting the Bedford Arms, Covent 
Garden, with a song, took water to Billingsgate, exchang- 
ing compliments with the bargemen as they went down 
the river. At Billingsgate, Hogarth made "a caracatura" 
of a facetious porter, called the Duke of Puddledock, who 
agreeably entertained the party with the humours of the 
place. Hence they took a Gravesend boat for themselves ; 
had straw to lie upon, and a tilt over their heads, they say, 
and went down the river at night, sleeping and singing 
jolly choruses. 

They arrived at Qravesend at six, when they washed 
their faces and hands, and had their wigs powdered. Then 
they sallied forth for Rochester on foot, and drank by the 
way three pots of ale. At one o'clock they went to dinner 
with excellent port, and a quantity more beer, and after- 
wards Hogarth and Scott played at hopscotch in the town 
hall. It would appear that they slept most of them in one 
room, and the chronicler of the party describes them all 
as waking at seven o'clock, and telling each other their 
dreams. You have rough sketches by Hogarth of the in- 

> He made this excursion in 1732, his companions being John Thornhill (son of 
Sir James), Scoll the landscape-jjaintcr, Tothall, and Forrest. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 205 

cidents of this holiday excursion. The sturdy little paint- 
er is seen sprawling over a plank to a boat at Grravesend ; 
the whole company are represented in one design, in a fish- 
erman's room, where they had all passed the night. One 
gentleman in a night-cap is shaving himself ; another is 
being shaved by the fisherman ; a third, with a handker- 
chief over his bald pate, is taking his breakfast ; and Ho- 
garth is sketching the whole scene. 

They describe at night how they returned to their quar- 
ters, drank to their friends, as usual, emptied several cans 
of good flip, all singing merrily. 

It is a jolly party of tradesmen engaged at highjinks. 
These were the manners and pleasures of Hogarth, of his 
time very likely, of men not very refined, but honest and 
merry. It is a brave London citizen, with John Bull hab- 
its, prejudices, and pleasures.* 



* " Dr. Johnson made four lines once, on the death of poor Hogarth, which were 
equally true and pleasing : I know not why Garrick's were preferred to them : — 
" ' The hand of him here torpid lies. 

That drew th' essential forms of grace ; 
Here closed in death, th' attentive eyes. 
That saw the manners in the face.' 

Mr. Hogarth, among the variety of kindnesses shown to me when I was too 
young to have a proper sense of them, was used to be very earnest that I should 
obtain the acquaintance, and if possible, the friendship of Dr. Johnson ; whose con- 
versation was, to the talk of other men, like Titian's painting compared to Hud- 
son's, he said : ' but don't you tell people now that I say so (continued he) for the 
connoisseurs and I are at war, you know ; and because I hate them, they think I 

hate Titian — and let them ! Of Dr. Johnson, when my father and he were 

talking about him one day, ' That man (says Hogarth) is not contented with believ- 
ing the Bible ; but he fairly resolves, I think, to believe nothing but the Bible. 
Johnson (added he), though so wise a fellow, is more like King David than King 
Solomon, for he says in his haste, all men are liars' " — Mrs. Piozzi. 

Hogarth died on the 26th of October, 1764. The day before his death, he was 
removed from his villa at Cliiswick to Leicester Fields, " in a very weak condition, 



206 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Of Smollett's associates, and manner of life, the author 
of the admirable " Humphrey Clinker" has given us an 
interesting account, in that most amusing of novels/ 

yet remarkably cheerful." He had just received an agreeable letter from Frank- 
lin. He lies buried at Chiswick. 

' TO SIR WATKIN PHILLIPS, BART., OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXON. 

" Dear Phillips, — In my last, I mentioned my having spent an evening with a 
society of authors, who seemed to be jealous and afraid of one another. My uncle 
was not at all surprised to hear me say I was disappointed in their conversation. 
' A man may be very entertaining and instructive upon paper,' said he, ' and exceed- 
ingly dull in common discourse. I have observed, that those who shine most in pri- 
vate company are but secondary stars in the constellation of genius. A small slock 
of ideas is more easily managed, and sooner displayed, than a great quantity crowd- 
ed together. There is very seldom anything extraordinary in the appearance and 
address of a good writer ; whereas a dull author generally distinguishes himself by 
some oddity or extravagance. For this reason I fancy that an assembly of Grubs 
must be veiy diverting.' 

" My curiosity being excited by this hint, I consulted my friend Dick Ivy, who 
undertook to gratify it the very next day, which was Sunday last. He carried me 
to dine with S — , whom you and I have long known by his writings. He lives in 
the skirts of the town ; and every Sunday his house is open to all unfortunate 
brothers of the quill, whom he treats with beef, pudding, and potatoes, port, punch, 
and Calvert's entire butt beer. He has fixed upon the first day of the week for the 
exercise of his hospitality, because some of his guests could not enjoy it on any 
other, for reasons that I need not explain. I was civilly received in a plain, yet 
decent habitation, which opened backwards into a very pleasant garden, kept in 
excellent order ; and, indeed, I saw none of the outward signs of authorship either 
in the house or the landlord, who is one of those few writers of the age that stand 
upon their own foundation, without patronage, and above dependence. If there 
was nothing characteristic in the entertainer, the company made ample amends for 
his want of singularity. 

" At two in the afternoon, I found myself one of ten messmates seated at table ; 
and I question if the whole kingdom could produce such another assemblage of 
originals. Among their peculiarities, I do not mention those of dress, which may 
be purely accidental. Wliat struck me were oddities originally produced by affec- 
tation, and afterwards confirmed by habit. One of them wore spectacles at dinner, 
and another his hat flapped ; though (as Ivy told me) the first was noted foi having 
a seaman's eye, when a bailiff was in the wind ; and the other was never known 
to labour under any weakness or defect of vision, except about five years ago, when 
he was complimented with a couple of black eyes by a player, with whom he had 
quarrelled in his drink. A third wore a laced stocking, and made use of crutches, 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 207 

I have no doubt that the above picture is as faithful a 
one as any from the pencil of his kindred humourist, Ho- 
garth. 

because, once in his life, he had been laid up with a broken leg, though no man 
could leap over a stick with more agility. A fourth had contracted such an antip- 
athy to the country, that he insisted upon sitting with his back towards the win- 
dow that looked into the garden ; and when a dish of cauliflower was set upon the 
table, he snuffed up volatile salts to keep him from fainting ; yet this delicate per- 
son was the son of a cottager, bom under a hedge, and had many years run wild 
among asses on a common. A fifth affected distraction : when spoke to, he always 
answered from the purpose. Sometimes he suddenly started up, and rapped out a 
dreadful oath ; sometimes he burst out a laughing ; then he folded his arms and 
sighed ; and then he hissed like fifty serpents. 

" At first I really thought he was mad ; and, as he sat near me, began to be under 
some misapprehensions for my own safety ; when our landlord, perceiving me 
alarmed, assured me aloud that I had nothing to fear. ' The gentleman,' said he, 
' is trying to act a part for which he is by no means qualified : if he had all the in- 
clination in the world, it is not in his power to be mad ; his spirits are too flat to be 
kindled into phrenzy.' ' 'Tis no bad p-p-puff", how-owever,' observed a person in a 
tarnished laced coat : ' aff-ffected m-madness w-will p-pass for w-wit w-with nine- 
ninet-teen out of t-twenty.' ' An aflTected stuttering for humour,' replied our land- 
lord ; ' though, God knows ! there is no affinity betwixt them.' It seems, this wag, 
after having made some abortive attempts in plain speaking, had recourse to this 
defect, by means of which he frequently extorted the laugh of the company, without 
the least expense of genius ; and that imperfection, which he had at first counter- 
feited, was now become so habitual that he could not lay it aside. 

" A certain winking genius, who wore yellow gloves at dinner, had, on his first 
introduction, taken such offence at S — , because he looked and talked, and ate and 
drank, like any other man, that he spoke contemptuously of his understanding ever 
after, and never would repeat his visit, until he had exhibited the following proof of 
his caprice. Wat Wyvil, the poet, having made some unsuccessful advances towards 
an intimacy with S — , at last gave him to understand, by a third person, that he had 
written a poem in his praise, and a satire against his person : that if he would ad- 
mit him to his house, the first should be immediately sent to press ; but that if he 
persisted in declining his friendship, he would publish the satire without delay. 
S — replied, that he looked upon Wyvil's panegyric as, in effect, a species of in- 
famy, and would resent it accordingly with a good cudgel ; but if he published the 
satire, he might deserve his compassion, and had nothing to fear from his revenge. 
Wyvil having considered the alternative, resolved to mortify S — by printing the 
panegyric, for which he received a sound drubbing. Then he swore the peace 
against the aggressor, who, in order to avoid a prosecution at law, admitted him to 



208 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

We have before us, and painted by his own hand, Tobias 
Smollett, the manly, kindly, honest and irascible; worn 

his good graces. It was the singularity in S — 's conduct, on this occasion, that rec- 
onciled him to the yellow-gloved philosopher, who owned he had some genius ; 
and from that period cultivated his acquaintance. 

" Curious to know upon what subjects the several talents of my fellow-guests 
were employed, I applied to my communicative friend Dick Ivy, who gave me to 
understand that most of them were, or had been, understrappers, or journeymen, to 
more creditable authors, for whom they translated, collated, and compiled, in the 
business of book-making ; and that all of them had, at different times, laboured in 
the service of our landlord, though they had now set up for themselves in various 
departments of literature. Not only their talents, but also their nations and dia- 
lects, were so various, that our conversation resembled the confusion of tongues at 
Babel. We had the Irish brogue, the Scotch accent, and foreign idiom, twanged 
off by the most discordant vociferation ; for as they all spoke together, no man had 
any chance to be heard, unless he could bawl louder than his fellows. It must be 
owned, however, there was nothing pedantic in their discourse ; they carefully 
avoided all learned disquisitions, and endeavoured to be facetious : nor did their 
endeavours always miscarry ; some droll repartee passed, and much laughter was 
excited ; and if any individual lost his temper so far as to transgress the bounds of 
decorum, he was effectually checked by the master of the feast, who exerted a sort 
of paternal authority over this irritable tribe. 

" The most learned philosopher of the whole collection, who had been expelled 
the university for atheism, has made great progress in a refutation of Lord Boling- 
broke's metaphysical works, which is said to be equally ingenious and orthodox : 
but, in the mean time, he has been presented to the grand jury as a public nuisance 
for having blasphemed in an alehouse on the Lord's-day. The Scotchman gives 
lectures on the pronunciation of the English language, which he is now publishing 
by subscription. 

" The Irishman is a political writer, and goes by the name of My Lord Potaloe. 
He wrote a pamphlet in vindication of a minister, hoping his zeal would be re- 
warded with some place or pension ; but finding himself neglected in that quarter, 
he whispered about that the pamphlet was written by the minister himself, and he 
published an answer to his ovro production. In this he addressed the author under 
the title of ' your lordship,' with such solemnity, that the public swallowed the de- 
ceit, and bought up the whole impression. The wise politicians of the metropolis 
declared they were both masterly performances, and chuckled over the flimsy rev- 
eries of an ignorant garretteer, as the profound speculations of a veteran statesman, 
acquainted with all the secrets of the cabinet. The imposture was detected in the 
sequel, and our Hibernian pamphleteer retains no part of his assumed importance 
but the bare title of ' my lord,' and the upper part of the table at the potatoe-ordin- 
ary in Shoe-lane. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 209 

and battered, but still brave and full of heart, after a long 
struggle against a hard fortune. His brain had been bus- 
ied with a hundred different schemes ; he had been re- 
viewer and historian, critic, medical writer, poet, pamph- 



" opposite to me sat a Piedmontese, who had obliged the public with a humor- 
ous satire, entitled ' The Balance of the English Poets ;' a performance which 
evinced the great modesty and taste of the author, and, in particular, his intimacy 
with the elegancies of the English language. The sage, who laboured under the 
aypoipoPia, or ' horror of green fields,' had just finished a treatise on practical agri- 
culture, though, in fact, he had never seen com growing in his life, and was so ig- 
norant of grain, that our entertainer, in the face of the whole company, made him 
own that a plate of hominy was the best rice-pudding he had ever eat. 

" The stutterer had almost finished his travels through Europe and part of Asia, 
without ever budging beyond the liberties of the King's-bench, except in term-time, 
with a tipstaflf for his companion : and as for little Tim Cropdale, the most face- 
tious member of the whole society, he had happily wound up the catastrophe of a vir- 
gin tragedy, from the exhibition of which he promised himself a large fund of profit 
and reputation. Tim had made shift to live many years by writing novels, at the 
rate of five pounds a volume ; but that branch of business is now engrossed by fe- 
male authors, who publish merely for the propagation of virtue, with so much ease, 
and spirit, and delicacy, and knowledge of the human heart, and all in the serene 
tranquillity of high life, that the reader is not only enchanted by their genius, but 
reformed by their morality. 

" After dinner, we adjourned into the garden, where I observed Mr. S — give a 
short separate audience to every individual in a small remote filbert-walk, from 
whence most of them dropped off one after another, without further ceremony." 

Smollett's house was in Lawrence-lane, Chelsea, and is now destroyed. See 
Handbook of London, p. 115. 

" The person of Smollett was eminently handsome, his features prepossessing, 
and, by the joint testimony of all his surviving friends, his conversation in the high- 
est degree instructive and amusing. Of his disposition, those who have read his 
works (and who has not ?) ma)' form a very accurate estimate ; for in each of them 
he has presented, and sometimes under various points of view, the leading features 
of his own character without disguising the most unfavourable of them. . . . When 
unseduced by his satirical propensities, he was kind, generous, and humane to 
others ; bold, upright, and independent in his own character ; stooped to no patron, 
sued for no favour, but honestly and honourably maintained himself on his literary 
labours. . . . He was a doating father, and an affectionate husband ; and the warm 
zeal with which his memory was cherished by his surviving friends, showed clearly 
the reliance which they placed upon his regard." — Sir Walter Scott. 



210 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

leteer. He had fought endless literary battles ; and braved 
and wielded for years the cudgels of controversy. It was 
a hard and savage fight in those days, and a niggard pay. 
He was oppressed by illness, age, narrow fortune ; but his 
spirit was still resolute, and his courage steady ; the battle 
over, he could do justice to the enemy with whom he had 
been so fiercely engaged, and give a not unfriendly grasp 
to the hand that had mauled him. He is like one of those 
Scotch cadets, of whom history gives us so many examples, 
and whom, with a national fidelity, the great Scotch novel- 
ist has painted so charmingly. Of gentle birth* and nar- 

^ Smollett of Bonhill, in Dumbartonshire. Arms, az. " a bend, or between a lion 

rampant, ppr, holding in his paw a banner, arg and a bugle-hom, also ppr. 

Crest, an oak-tree, ppr. Motto, Viresco." 

Smollett's father, Archibald, was the fourth son of Sir James Smollett of Bonhill, 
a Scotch judge and member of Parliament, and one of the commissioners for fram- 
ing the Union with England. Archibald married, without the old gentleman's con. 
sent, and died early, leaving his children dependent on their grandfather. Tobias, 
the second son, was bom in 1721, in the old house of Dalquham in the valley of 
Leven ; and all his life loved and admired that valley and Loch Lomond beyond 
all the valleys and lakes in Europe. He learned the " rudiments" at Dumbarton 
Grammar-school, and studied at Glasgow. 

But when he was only eighteen, his grandfather died, and left him without pro- 
vision (figuring as the old judge in " Roderick Random" in consequence, according 
to Sir Walter). Tobias, armed with the " Regicide," a tragedy — a provision pre- 
cisely similar to that with which Dr. Johnson had started, just before — came up to 
London. The " Regicide" came to no good, though at first patronised by Lord 
Lyttleton (" one of those little fellows who are sometimes called great men," Smol- 
lett says) ; and Smollett embarked as " surgeon's mate" on board a line-of-battle 
ship, and served in the Carthagena expedition, in 1741. He left the service in the 
West Indies, and, after residing some time in Jamaica, returned to England in 
1746. 

He was now unsuccessful as a physician, to begin with ; published the satires, 
"Advice" and "Reproof" — without any luck; and (1747) married the "beautiful 
and accomplished Miss Lascelles." 

In 1748 he brought out his " Roderick Random," which at once made a "hit." 
The subsequent events of his life may be presented chronologically, in a bird's-eye 
View: — 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 211 

row means, going out from his northern home to win his 
fortune in the world, and to fight his way, armed with 
courage, hunger, and keen wits. His crest is a shattered 
oak tree, with green leaves yet springing from it. On his 
ancient coat-of-arms there is a lion and a horn ; this shield 
of his was hattered and dinted in a hundred fights and 
brawls,^ through which the stout Scotchman bore it cour- 

1750. Made a tour to Paris, where he chiefly wrote " Peregrine Pickle." 

1751. Published "Peregrine Pickle." 

1753. Published "Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom." 

1755. Published version of " Don Quixote." 

1756. Began the " Critical Review." 
1758. Published his " Histoiy of England." 

1763 — 1766. Travelling in France and Italy ; published his " Travels." 

1769. Published " Adventures of an Atom." 

1770. Set out for Italy ; died at Leghorn 21st of Oct., 1771, in the fifty-first year 
of his age. 

* A good specimen of the old " slashing" style of writing is presented by the par- 
agraph on Admiral Knowles, which subjected Smollett to prosecution and imprison- 
ment. The admiral's defence on the occasion of the failure of the Rochfort expe- 
dition came to be examined before the tribunal of the " Critical Review." 

" He i-s," said our author, " an admiral without conduct, an engineer without 
knowledge, an ofiicer without resolution, and a man without veracity !" 

Three months' imprisonment in the King's Bench avenged this stinging para- 
graph. 

But the " Critical" was to Smollett a perpetual fountain of " hot water." 
Among less important controversies may be mentioned that with Grainger, the 
translator of " TibuUus." Grainger replied in a pamphlet ; and in the next number 
of the " Review" we find him threatened with " castigation," as an "owl that has 
broken from his mew !" 

In Dr. Moore's biography of him is a pleasant anecdote. After publishing the 
" Don Quixote," he returned to Scotland to pay a visit to his mother : — 

"On Smollett's arrival, he was introduced to his mother with the connivance of 
Mrs. Telfer (her daughter), as a gentleman from the West Indies, who was inti- 
mately acquainted with her son. The better to support his assumed character, he 
endeavoured to preserve a serious countenance, approaching to a frown ; but while 
his mother's eyes were riveted on his countenance, he could not refrain from smil- 
ing : she immediately sprung from her chair, and throwing her arms round his neck, 
exclaimed, ' Ah, my son ! my son ! I have found you at last !' 

" She afterwards told him, that if he had kept his austere looks and continued to 



212 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ageously. You see somehow that he is a gentleman, 
through all his battling and struggling, his poverty, his 
hard-fought successes, and his defeats. His novels are 
recollections of his own adventures ; his characters drawn, 
as I should think, from personages with whom he became 
acquainted in his own career of life. Strange companions 
he must have had ; queer acquaintances he made in the 
Grlasgow College — in the country apothecary's shop ; in 
the gun-room of the man-of-war where he served as sur- 
geon, and in the hard life on shore, where the sturdy ad- 
venturer struggled for fortune. He did not invent much, 
as I fancy, but had the keenest perceptive faculty, and de- 
scribed what he saw with wonderful relish and delightful 
broad humour. I think Uncle Bowling, in " Roderick 
Random," is as good a character as Squire Western him- 
self ; and Mr, Morgan, the wild apothecary, is as pleasant 
as Dr. Caius. What man who has made his inestimable 
acquaintance — what novel reader who loves Don Quixote 
and Major Dalgetty — will refuse his most cordial acknowl- 
edgments to the admirable Lieutenant Lismahago. The 
novel of "Humphrey Clinker" is, I do think, the most 



gloom, he might have escaped detection some time longer, but ' your old roguish 
smile,' added she, ' betrayed you at once.' " 

" Shortly after the publication of ' The Adventures of an Atom,' disease again 
attacked Smollett with redoubled violence. Attempts being vainly made to obtain 
for him the office of Consul, in some part of the Mediterranean, he was compelled 
to seek a warmer climate, without better means of provision than his own preca- 
rious finances could afford. The kindness of his distinguished friend and country- 
man, Dr. Armstrong (then abroad), procured for Dr. and Mrs. Smollett a house at 
Monte Nero, a village situated on the side of a mountain overlooking the sea, in the 
neighbourhood of Leghorn, a romantic and salutary abode, where he prepared for 
the press the last, and like music ' sweetest in the close,' the most pleasing of his 
compositions, ' The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker.' This delightful work was 
published in 177L" — Sir Walter Scott. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 213 

laughable story that has ever been written since the good- 
ly art of novel- writing began. Winifred Jenkins and Ta- 
bitha Bramble must keep Englishmen on the grin for ages 
yet to come ; and in their letters and the story of their 
loves there is a perpetual fount of sparkling laughter, as 
inexhaustible as Bladud's well. 

Fielding, too, has described, though with a greater hand, 
the characters and scenes which he knew and saw. He 
had more than ordinary opportunities for becoming ac- 
quainted with life. His family and education, first — his 
fortunes and misfortunes afterwards, brought him into the 
society of every rank and condition of man. He is himself 
the hero of his books : he is wild Tom Jones, he is wild 
Captain Booth, less wild, I am glad to think, than his pred- 
ecessor, at least heatily conscious of demerit, and anxious 
to amend. 

When Fielding first came upon the town in 1727, the 
recollection of the great wits was still fresh in the coffee- 
houses and assemblies, and the judges there declared that 
young Harry Fielding had more spirits and wit than Con- 
greve or any of his brilliant successors. His figure was tall 
and stalwart ; his face handsome, manly, and noble-look- 
ing ; to the very last days of his life he retained a gran- 
deur of air, and, although worn down by disease, his aspect 
and presence imposed respect upon the people round about 
him. A dispute took place between Mr. Fielding and the 
captain* of the ship in which he was making his last voy- 



* The dispute with the captain arose from the wish of that functionary to intrude 
on his right to his cabin, for which he had paid thirty pounds. After recounting the 
circumstances of the apology, he characteristically adds : — 



214 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

age, and Fielding relates how the man finally went down 
on his knees and begged his passenger's pardon. He was 
living up to the last days of his life, and his spirit never 
gave in. His vital power must have been immensely 
strong. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu^ prettily charac- 
terises Fielding and this capacity for happiness which he 
possessed, in a little notice of his death, when she compares 
him to Steele, who was as improvident and as happy as he 
was, and says that both should have gone on living for ever. 
One can fancy the eagerness and gusto with which a man 
of Fielding's frame, with his vast health and robust appe- 
tite, his ardent spirits, his joyful humour, and his keen and 
hearty relish for life, must have seized and drunk that cup 



" And here, that I may not be thought the sly trumpeter of my own praises, I do 
utterly disclaim all praise on the occasion. Neither did the greatness of my mind 
dictate, nor the force of my Christianity exact this forgiveness. To speak truth, I 
forgave him from a motive which make men much more forgiving, if they were much 
wiser than they are ; because it was convenient for me so to do." 

* Lady Mary was his second cousin — their respective grandfathers being sons of 
George Fielding, Earl of Desmond, son of William, Earl of Denbigh. 

In a letter dated just a week before his death, she says, — 

" H. Fielding has given a true picture of himself and his first wife in the charac- 
ters of Mr. and Mrs. Booth, some compliments to his own figure excepted ; and I 
am persuaded several of the incidents he mentions are real matters of fact. I won- 
der he does not perceive Tom Jones and Mr. Booth are sorry scoundrels 

Fielding has really a fund of true humour, and was to be pitied at his first entrance 
into the world, having no choice, as he said himself, but to be a hackney writer or 
a hackney coachman. His genius deserved a better fate ; but I cannot help blaming 
that continued indiscretion, to give it the softest name, that has run through his 

life, and I am afraid still remains Since I was born no original has appeared 

excepting Congreve, and Fielding, who would, I believe, have approached nearer to 
his excellencies, if not forced by his necessities to publish without correction, and 
throw many productions into the world he would have thrown into the fire, if meat 
could have been got without money, or money without scribbling. ... I am sorry 
not to see any more of Peregrine Pickle's performances ; I wish you would tell me 
his name." — Letters and Works (Lord Wharnclifl'e's Ed.) vol. iii. p. 93, 94. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 215 

of pleasure which the town offered to him. Can any of 
my hearers remember the youthful feats of a college break- 
fast — the meats devoured and the cups quaffed in that 
Homeric feast ? I can call to mind some of the heroes of 
those youthful banquets, and fancy young Fielding from 
Leyden rushing upon the feast, with his great laugh and 
immense healthy young appetite, eager and vigorous to 
enjoy. The young man's wit and manners made him 
friends everywhere : he lived with the grand Man's society 
of those days : he was courted by peers and men of wealth 
and fashion. As he had a paternal allowance from his fa- 
ther, Greneral Fielding, which, to use Henry's own phrase, 
any man might pay who would ; as he liked good wine, 
good clothes, and good company, which are all expensive 
articles to purchase, Harry Fielding began to run into debt, 
and borrow money in that easy manner in which Captain 
Booth borrows money in the novel : was in nowise particu- 
lar in accepting a few pieces from the purses of his rich 
friends, and bore down upon more than one of them, as 
"Walpole tells us only too truly, for a dinner or a guinea. 
To supply himself with the latter, he began to write theat- 
rical pieces, having already, no doubt, a considerable ac- 
quaintance amongst the Oldfields and Bracegirdles behind 
the scenes. He laughed at these pieces and scorned them. 
When the audience upon one occasion began to hiss a scene 
which he was too lazy to correct, and regarding which, 
when Garrick remonstrated with him, he said that the 
public was too stupid to find out the badness of his work ; 
— when the audience began to hiss. Fielding said, with 
characteristic coolness — " they have found it out, have 
they?" He did not prepare his novels in this way, and 



216 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

with a very different care and interest laid the foundations 
and built up the edifices of his future fame. 

Time and shower have very little damaged those The 
fashion and ornaments are, perhaps, of the architecture of 
that age ; but the buildings remain strong and lofty, and 
ot admirable proportions — masterpieces of genius and mon- 
uments of workman-like skill. 

I cannot offer or hope to make a hero of Harry Fielding. 
Why hide his faults ? Why conceal his weaknesses in a 
cloud of periphrasis ? Why not show him, like him as he 
is, not robed in a marble toga, and draped and polished in 
a heroic attitude, but with inked ruffles, and claret stains 
on his tarnished laced coat, and on his manly face the 
marks of good fellowship, of illness, of kindness, of care, 
and wine. Stained as you see him, and worn by care and 
dissipation, that man retains some of the most precious and 
splendid human qualities and endowments. He has an 
admirable natural love of truth, the keenest instinctive an- 
tipathy to hypocrisy, the happiest satirical gift of laughing 
it to scorn. His wit is wonderfully wise and detective ; 
it flashes upon a rogue and lightens up a rascal like a po- 
liceman's lantern. He is one of the manliest and kindliest 
of human beings : in the midst of all his imperfections, he 
respects female innocence and infantine tenderness, as you 
would suppose such a great-hearted, courageous soul would 
respect and care for them. He could not be so brave, gen- 
erous, truth-telling as he is, were he not infinitely merci- 
ful, pitiful, and tender. He will give any man his purse — 
he cannot help kindness and profusion. He may have low 
tastes, but not a mean mind ; he admires with all his heart 
good and virtuous men, stoops to no flattery, bears no ran-? 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 217 

cour, disdains all disloyal arts, does his public duty up- 
rightly, is fondly loved by his family, and dies at his work.' 

If that theory be — and I have no doubt it is — the right 
and safe one, that human nature is always pleased with 
the spectacle of innocence rescued by fidelity, purity, and 
courage ; I suppose that of the heroes of Fielding's three 
novels, we should like honest Joseph Andrews the best, and 
Captain Booth the second, and Tom Jones the third.' 

Joseph Andrews, though he wears Lady Booby's cast- 
off livery, is, I think, to the full as polite as Tom Jones in 
his fustian-suit, or Captain Booth in regimentals. He has, 
like those heroes, large calves, broad shoulders, a high 
courage, and a handsome face. The accounts of Joseph's 
bravery and good qualities ; his voice, too musical to halloo 
to the dogs ; his bravery in riding races for the gentlemen 
of the county, and his constancy in refusing bribes and 
temptation, have something affecting in their naivete and 
freshness, and prepossess one in favour of that handsome 
young hero. The rustic bloom of Fanny, and the delight- 
ful simplicity of Parson Adams are described with a friend- 
liness which wins the reader of their story : we part with 
them with more regret than from Booth and Jones. 

Fielding, no doubt, began to write this novel in ridicule 
of "Pamela," for which work one can understand the 

* He sailed for Lisbon, from Gravesend, on Sunday morning, June 30th, 1754 ; 
and began the " Journal of a Voyage" during the passage. He died at Lisbon, in 
the beginning of October of the same year. He lies buried there, in the English 
Protestant church-yard, near the Estrella Church, with this inscription over him : — 

"henricus fielding, 

luget britannia gremio ngn datum 

fovere natum." 

* Fielding himself is said by Dr. Warton to have preferred " Joseph Andrevrs" 
to his other writings. 

K 



218 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

hearty contempt and antipathy which such an athletic 
and boisterous genius as Fielding's must have entertained. 
He could not do otherwise than laugh at the puny, cock- 
ney bookseller, pouring out endless volumes of sentimental 
twaddle, and hold him up to scorn as a moll-coddle and a 
milksop. His genius had been nursed on sack-posset, and 
not on dishes of tea. His muse had sung the loudest in 
tavern choruses, had seen the daylight streaming in over 
thousands of emptied bowls, and reeled home to chambers 
on the shoulders of the watchman. Richardson's goddess 
was attended by old maids and dowagers, and fed on muf- 
fins and bohea. "Milksop!" roars Harry Fielding, clatter- 
ing at the timid shop-shutters. "Wretch ! Monster ! Mo- 
hock !" shrieks the sentimental author of " Pamela ;'" and 
all the ladies of his court cackle out an affrighted chorus. 
Fielding proposes to write a book in ridicule of the author, 
whom he disliked and utterly scorned and laughed at ; but 
he is himself of so generous, jovial, and kindly a turn that 
he begins to like the characters which he invents, cannot 
help making them manly and pleasant as well as ridicu- 
lous, and before he has done with them all loves them 
heartily every one. 

Richardson's sickening antipathy for Harry Fielding is 
quite as natural as the other's laughter and contempt at 



* " Richardson," says worthy Mrs. Barbauld, in her Memoir of him, prefixed to 
his Correspondence, " was exceedingly hurt at this (' Joseph Andrews'), the more so 
as they had been on good terms, and he was very intimate with Fielding's two sis- 
ters. He never appears cordially to have forgiven it (perhaps it was not in human 
nature he should), and he always speaks in his letters with a great deal of asperity 
of ' Tom Jones,' more indeed than was quite graceful in a rival author. No doubt 
he himself thought his indignation was solely excited by the loose morality of the 
work and of its author, but he could tolerate Gibber." 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 219 

the sentimentalist. I have not learned that these likings 
and dislikings have ceased in the present day : and every 
author must lay his account not only to misrepresentation, 
but to honest enmity among critics, and to being hated 
and abused for good as well as for bad reasons. Richard- 
son disliked Fielding's works quite honestly : Walpole quite 
honestly spoke of them as vulgar and stupid. Their 
squeamish stomachs sickened at the rough fare and the 
rough guests assembled at Fielding's jolly revel. Indeed 
the cloth might have been cleaner : and the dinner and the 
company were scarce such as suited a dandy. The kind 
and wise old Johnson would not sit down with him.' But 
a greater scholar than Johnson could afford to admire that 
astonishing genius of Harry Fielding : and we all know 
the lofty panegyric which G-ibbon wrote of him, and which 
remains a towering monument to the great novelist's mem- 
ory. "Our immortal Fielding," G-ibbon writes, "was of 
the younger branch of the Earls of Denbigh, who drew 
their origin from the Counts of Hapsburgh. The success- 
ors of Charles V. may disdain their brethren of England : 
but the romance of ' Tom Jones,' that exquisite picture of 
human manners, will outlive the palace of the Escurial 
and the Imperial Eagle of Austria." There can be no 
gainsaying the sentence of this great judge. To have 
your name mentioned by G-ibbon, is like having it written 
on the dome of St. Peter's. Pilgrims from all the world 
admire and behold it. 



* It must always be borne in mind, that besides that the Doctor could not be ex- 
pected to like Fielding's wild life (to say nothing of the fact that they were of op- 
posite sides in politics), Richardson was one of his earliest and kindest friends. 
Yet Johnson too (as Boswell tells us) read " Amelia" through without " stopping." 



220 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

As a picture of manners the novel of " Tom Jones" is 
indeed exquisite : as a work of construction quite a won- 
der : the by-play of wisdom ; the power of observation ; 
the multiplied felicitous turns and thoughts ; the varied 
character of the great Comic Epic ; keep the reader in a 
perpetual admiration and curiosity/ But against Mr. 
Thomas Jones himself we have a right to put in a protest, 
and quarrel with the esteem the author evidently has for 
that character. Charles Lamb says finely of Jones, that 
a single hearty laugh from him " clears the air" — but 
then it is in a certain state of the atmosphere. It might 
clear the air when such personages as Blifil or Lady Bel- 
laston poison it. But I fear very much that (except until 
the very last scene of the story), when Mr. Jones enters 
Sophia's drawing-room, the pure air there is rather tainted 
with the young gentleman's tobacco-pipe and punch. I 
cannot say that I think Mr. Jones a virtuous character ; I 
cannot say but that I think Fielding's evident liking and 
admiration for Mr. Jones, shows that the great humourist's 



^ " Manners change from generation to generation, and with manners morals ap- 
pear to change, — actually change with some, but appear to change with all but the 
abandoned. A young man of the present day who should act as Tom Jones is sup- 
posed to act at Upton, with Lady Bellaston, &c., would not be a Tom Jones ; and 
a Tom Jones of the present day, without perhaps being in the ground a better man, 
would have perished rather than submit to be kept by a harridan of fortune. There- 
fore, this novel is, and indeed, pretends to be no example of conduct. But, not- 
withstanding all this, I do loathe the cant which can recommend ' Pamela' and 
' Clarissa Harlowe' as strictly moral, although they poison the imagination of the 
young with continued doses of tinct. lyttm, while Tom Jones is prohibited as loose. 
I do not speak of young women ; but a young man whose heart or feelings can be 
injured, or even his passions excited by this novel, is already thoroughly corrupt. 
There is a cheerful, sunshiny, breezy spirit, that prevails everywhere, strongly con- 
trasted with the close, hot, day-dreamy continuity of Richardson." — Coleridge, 
Literary Remains, vol. ii. p. 374. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 221 

moral sense was blunted by his life, and that here in Art 
and Ethics, there is a great error. If it is right to have a 
hero, whom we may admire, let us at least take care that 
he is admirable : if, as is the plan of some authors (a plan 
decidedly against their interests, be it said), it is propound- 
ed that there exists in life no such being, and therefore 
that in novels, the picture of life, there should appear no 
such character ; then Mr. Thomas Jones becomes an ad- 
missible person, and we examine his defects and good qual- 
ities, as we do those of Parson Thwackum, or Miss Seagrim. 
But a hero with a flawed reputation ; a hero spunging for 
a guinea ; a hero who cannot pay his landlady, and is 
obliged to let his honour out to hire, is absurd, and his 
claim to heroic rank untenable. I protest against Mr. 
Thomas Jones holding such rank at all. I protest even 
against his being considered a more than ordinary young 
fellow, ruddy-cheeked, broad-shouldered, and fond of wine 
and pleasure. He would not rob a church, but that is all ; 
and a pretty long argument may be debated, as to which 
of these old types, the spendthrift, the hypocrite, Jones and 
Blifil, Charles and Joseph Surface, — is the worst member 
of society and the most deserving of censure. The prod- 
igal Captain Booth is a better man than his predecessor 
Mr. Jones, in so far as he thinks much more humbly of 
himself than Jones did : goes down on his knees, and owns 
his weaknesses, and cries out "Not for my sake, but for 
the sake of my pure and sweet and beautiful wife Amelia, 
I pray you, critical reader, to forgive me." That stern 
moralist regards him from the bench (the judge's practice 
out of court is not here the question), and says, " Captain 
Booth, it is perfectly true that your life has been disrepu- 



2S2 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

table, and that on many occasions you have shown yourself 
to be no better than a scamp — you have been tippling at 
the tavern, when the kindest and sweetest lady in the 
world has cooked your little supper of boiled mutton and 
awaited you all the night ; you have spoilt the little dish 
of boiled mutton thereby, and caused pangs and pains to 
Amelia's tender heart.' You have got into debt without 
the means of paying it. You have gambled the money 
with which you ought to have paid your rent. You have 
spent in drink or in worse amusements the sums which 
your poor wife has raised upon her little home treasures, 
her own ornaments, and the toys of her children. But, 
you rascal ! you own humbly that you are no better than 



* " Nor was she (Lady Mary' Wortley Montagu) a stranger to that beloved first 
wife, whose picture he drew in his ' Amelia,' when, as she said, even the glowing 
language he knew how to employ, did not do more than justice to the amiable qual- 
ities of the original, or to her beauty, although this had suffered a little from the ac- 
cident related in the novel, — ;a frightful overturn, which destroyed the gristle of her 
nose. He loved her passionately, and she returned his affection 

" His biographers seem to have been shy of disclosing that after the death of this 
.charming woman, he married her maid. And yet the act was not so discreditable 
to his character as it may sound. The maid had few personal charms, but was an 
excellent creature, devotedly attached to her mistress, and almost broken-hearted 
for her loss. In the first agonies of his own grief, which approached to frenzy, he 
found no relief but from weeping along with her; nor solace when a degree calmer, 
but in talking to her of the angel they mutually regretted. This made her his ha- 
bitual confidential associate, and in process of time he began to think he could not 
give his children a tenderer mother, or secure for himself a more faithful house- 
keeper and nurse. At least, this was what he told his friends ; and it is certain 
that her conduct as his wife confirmed it, and fully justified his good opinion." — 
Letters and Works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Edited by Lord Wharncliffe. 
Introductory Anecdotes, vol. i. p. 80, 81. 

Fielding's first wife was Miss Craddock, a young lady from Salisbury, with a for- 
tune of 1500/., whom he married in 1736. About the same time he succeeded, him- 
self, to an estate of 200Z. per annum, and on the joint amount he lived for some 
time as a splendid country gentleman in Derbyshire. Three years brought him to 
the end of his fortune ; when he returned to London, and became a student of law. 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 223 

you should be ; you never for one moment pretend that 
you are anything but a miserable weak-minded rogue. 
You do in your heart adore that angelic woman, your wife, 
and for her sake, sirrah, you shall have your discharge. 
Luclcy for you and for others like you, that in spite of your 
failings and imperfections, pure hearts pity and love you. 
For your wife's sake you are permitted to go hence with- 
out a remand, and I beg you, by the way, to carry to that 
angelical lady the expression of the cordial respect and ad- 
miration of this court." Amelia pleads for her husband. 
Will Booth : Amelia pleads for her reckless kindly old 
father, Harry Fielding. To have invented that character, 
is not only a triumph of art, but it is a good action. They 
say it was in his own home that Fielding knew her and 
loved her : and from his own wife that he drew the most 
charming character in English fiction — Fiction ! why fic- 
tion ? why not history ? I know Amelia just as well as 
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. I believe in Colonel Bath 
almost as much as in Colonel Gardiner or the Duke of 
Cumberland. I admire the author of "Amelia," and thank 
the kind master who introduced me to that sweet and de- 
lightful companion and friend. Amelia perhaps is not a 
better story than " Tom Jones," but it has the better 
ethics ; the prodigal repents at least, before forgiveness, — 
whereas that odious broad-backed Mr. Jones, carries off his 
beauty with scarce an interval of remorse for his manifold 
errors and short-comings ; and is not half punished enough 
before the great prize of fortune and love falls to his share. 
I am angry with Jones. Too much of the plum-cake and 
rewards of life fall to that boisterous, swaggering young 
scapegrace. Sophia actually surrenders without a proper 



224 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

sense of decorum ; the fond, foolish, palpitating little creat- 
ure, — " Indeed, Mr. Jones," she says, — "it rests with you 
to appoint the day." I suppose Sophia is drawn from life 
as well as Amelia, and many a young fellow, no better 
than Mr. Thomas Jones, has carried by a coup de main the 
heart of many a kind girl who was a great deal too good 
for him. 

"What a wonderful art ! "What an admirable gift of na- 
ture, was it by which the author of these tales was en- 
dowed, and which enabled him to fix our interest, to waken 
our sympathy, to seize upon our credulity, so that we be- 
lieve in his people — speculate gravely upon their faults or 
their excellencies, prefer this one or that, deplore Jones's 
fondness for drink and play, Booth's fondness for play and 
drink, and the unfortunate position of the wives of both 
gentlemen — love and admire those ladies with all our hearts, 
and talk about them as faithfully as if we had breakfasted 
with them this morning in their actual drawing-rooms, or 
should meet them this afternoon in the Park ! What a 
genius ! what a vigour, what a bright-eyed intelligence 
and observation ! what a wholesome hatred for meanness 
and knavery ! what a vast sympathy ! what a cheerfulness ! 
what a manly relish of life ! what a love of human kind ! 
what a poet is here ! — watching, meditating, brooding, 
creating ! "What multitudes of truths has that man left 
behind him ! What generations he has taught to laugh 
wisely and fairly ! What scholars he has formed and ac- 
customed to the exercise of thoughtful humour and the 
manly play of wit ! What a courage he had !' What a 

* In the " Gentleman's Magazine" for 178G, an anecdote is related of Harrj* Field- 
ing, " in whom," says the correspondent, " good-nature and philanthropy in their 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 225 

dauntless and constant cheerfulness of intellect, that burned 
bright and steady through all the storms of his life, and 
never deserted its last wreck ! It is wonderful to think of 
the pains and misery which the man suffered ; the pres- 
sure of want, illness, remorse which he endured ; and that 
the writer was neither malignant nor melancholy, his view 
of truth never warped, and his generous human kindness 
never surrendered.' 



extreme degree were known to be the prominent features." It seems that " some 
parochial taxes" for his house in Beaufort Buildings had long been demanded by 
the collector. " At last, Harry went off to Johnson, and obtained by a process of 
literary mortgage the needful sum. He was returning with it, when he met an old 
college chum whom he had not seen for many years. He asked the chum to dinner 
with him at a neighbouring tavern ; and learning that he was in difficulties, emptied 
the contents of his pocket into his. On returning home he was informed that the 
collector had been twice for the money. ' Friendship has called for the money and 
had it,' said Fielding, ' let the collector call again.' " 

It is elsewhere told of him, that being in company with the Earl of Denbigh, his 
kinsman, and the conversation turning upon their relationship, the Earl asked him 
how it was that he spelled his name " Fielding," and not " Feilding," like the head 
of the house ? "I cannot tell, my lord," said he, " except it be that my branch of 
the family were the first that knew how to spell." 

1 In 1749, he was made Justice of the Peace for Westminster and Middlesex, an 
office then paid by fees, and very laborious, without being particularly reputable. 
It may be seen from his own words, in the Introduction to the " Voyage," what 
kind of work devolved upon him and in what a state he was, during these last years ; 
and still more clearly, how he comported himself through all. 

" Whilst I was preparing for my journey, and when I was almost fatigued to death 
with several long examinations, relating to five different murders, all committed 
within the space of a week, by different gangs of street-robbers, I received a mes- 
sage from his Grace the Duke of Newcastle, by Mr. Carrington, the King's messen- 
ger, to attend his Grace the next morning in Lincoln's Inn Fields, upon some busi- 
ness of importance : but I excused myself from complying with the message, as 
besides being lame, I was very ill with the great fatigues I had lately undergone, 
added to my distemper. 

"His Grace, however, sent Mr. Carrington the very next morning, with another 
summons ; with which, though in the utmost distress, I immediately complied ; but 
the Duke happening, unfortunately for me, to be then particularly engaged, after I 
had waited some time, sent a gentleman to discourse with me on the best plan which 

K2 



226 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

In the quarrel mentioned before, which happened on 
Fielding's last voyage to Lisbon, and when the stout cap- 
tain of the ship fell down on his knees and asked the sick 
man's pardon — " I did not suffer," Fielding says, in his 
hearty, manly way, his eyes lighting up as it were with 
their old fire — " I did not suffer a brave man and an old 
man to remain a moment in that posture, but immediately 

could be invented for these murders and robberies, which were every day committed 
in the streets ; upon which I promised to transmit my opinion, in writing, to his 
Grace;, who, as the gentleman informed me, intended to lay it before the Privy 
Council. 

"Though this visit cost me a severe cold, I, notwithstanding, set myself down to 
work, and in about four days sent the Duke as regular a plan as I could form, with 
all the reasons and arguments I could bring to support it, drawn out on several 
sheets of paper; and soon received a message from the Duke, by Mr. Carrington, 
acquainting me that my plan was highly approved of, and that all the terms of it 
would be complied with. 

" The principal and most material of these terms was the immediately depositing 
600/. in my hands ; at which small charge I undertook to demolish the then reigning 
gangs, and to put the civil policy into such order, that no such gangs should ever be 
able for the future, to form themselves into bodies, or at least to remain any time 
formidable to the public. 

" I had delayed my Bath journey for some time, contrary to the repeated advice of 
my physical acquaintances, and the ardent desire of my wannest friends, though my 
distemper was now turned to a deep jaundice ; in which case the Bath-waters are 
generally reputed to be almost infallible. But I had the most eager desire to de- 
molish this gang of villains and cut-throats 

" After some weeks the money was paid at the Treasury, and within a few days, 
after 200/. of it had oome to my hands, the whole gang of cut-throats was entirely 
dispersed." .... 

Further on, he says, — 

" I will confess that my private affairs at the begmning of the winter liad but a 
gloomy aspect ; for I had not plundered the public or the poor of those sums, which 
men who are always ready to plunder both as much as they can, have been pleased 
to snspect me of taking ; on the contrary, by composing, instead of inflaming, the 
quarrels of porters and beggars (which I blush when I say hath not been universally 
practised), and by refusing to take a shilling from a man who most undoubtedly 
would not have had another left, I had reduced an income of about 500/. a year of 
the dirtiest money upon earth, to little more than 300/., a considerable portion of 
which remained with my clerk." 



HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 227 

forgave him." Indeed, I think, with his noble spirit and 
unconquerable generosity. Fielding reminds one of those 
brave men of whom one reads in stories of English ship- 
wrecks and disasters — of the officer on the African shore, 
when disease has destroyed the crew, and he himself is 
seized by fever, who throws the lead with a death-stricken 
hand, takes the soundings, carries the ship out of the river 
or off the dangerous coast, and dies in the manly endeavour 
— of the wounded captain, when the vessel founders, who 
never loses his heart, who eyes the danger steadily, and has 
a cheery word for all, until the inevitable fate overwhelms 
him, and the gallant ship goes down. Such a brave and 
gentle heart, such an intrepid and courageous spirit, I love 
to recognise in the manly, the English Harry Fielding. 



LECTURE THE SIXTH. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 

Roger Sterne, Sterne's father, was the second son of a 
numerous race, descendants of Richard Sterne, Archbishop 
of York, in the reign of James II. ; and children of Simon 
Sterne and Mary Jaques, his wife, heiress of Elvington, 
near York.' Roger was a lieutenant in Handiside's regi- 
ments, and engaged in Flanders, in Q,ueen Anne's wars. 
He married the daughter of a noted suttler, " N.B., he was 
in debt to him," his son writes, pursuing the paternal biog- 
raphy, and marched through the world with this compan- 
ion, following the regiment and bringing many children to 
poor Roger Sterne. The captain was an irascible but kind 
and simple little man, Sterne says, and informs us that his 
sire was run through the body at Gribraltar, by a brother 
officer, in a duel, which arose out of a dispute about a goose. 
Roger never entirely recovered from the effects of this ren- 
contre, but died presently at Jamaica, whither he had fol- 
lowed the drum. 

Lawrence, his second child, was borne at Clonmel, in 
Ireland, in 1713, and travelled for the first ten years of his 
life, on his father's march, from barrack to transport, from 
Ireland to England.^ One relative of his mother's took her 



* He came of a Suffolk family — one of whom settled in Nottinghamshire. The 
famous " starling" was actually the family crest. 

' " It was in this parish (of Anirao, in Wicklow), during our stay, that I had that 
wonderful escape in falling through a mill-race, whilst the mill was going, and of be- 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 229 

and her family under shelter for ten months at MuUingar : 
another collateral descendant of the Archbishop's housed 
them for a year at his castle near Carrickfergus. Larry 
Sterne was put to school at Halifax in England, finally was 
adopted by his kinsman of Elvington, and parted company 
with his father, the Captain, who marched on his path of 
life till he met the fatal goose, which closed his career. 
The most picturesque and delightful parts of Lawrence 
Sterne's writings, we owe to his recollections of the military 
life. Trim's montero cap, and Le Fevre's sword, and dear 
Uncle Toby's roquelaure, are doubtless reminiscences of 
the boy, who had lived with the followers of William and 
Marlborough, and had beat time with his little feet to the 
fifes of Ramillies in Dublin barrack-yard, or played with 
the torn flags and halberds of Malplaquet on the parade 
ground at Clonmel. 

Lawrence remained at Halifax school till he was eight- 
een years old. His wit and cleverness appear to have ac- 
quired the respect of his master here : for when the usher 
whipped Lawrence for writing his name on the newly white- 
washed school-room ceiling, the pedagogue in chief rebuked 
the under-strapper, and said that the name should never be 
effaced, for Sterne was a boy of genius, and would come to 
preferment. 

His cousin, the Squire of Elvington, sent Sterne to Jesus 
College, Cambridge, where he remained five years, and tak- 
ing orders, got, through his uncle's interest, the living of 
Sutton and the Prebendary of York. Through his wife's 
connexions, he got the living of Stillington. He married 

ing taken up unhurt ; the story is incredible, but known for truth in all that part 
of Ireland, where hundreds of the common people flocked to see me." — Sterne. 



230 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

her in 1741 ; having ardently courted the young lady for 
some years previously. It was not until the young lady 
fancied herself dying, that she made Sterne acquainted with 
the extent of her liking for him. One evening when he 
was sitting with her, with an almost broken heart to see 
her so ill (the Rev. Mr. Sterne's heart was a good deal 
broken in the course of his life), she said — " My dear Lau- 
rey, I never can be yours, for I verily believe I have not 
long to live, but I have left you every shilling of my for- 
tune," a generosity which overpowered Sterne : she recov- 
ered : and so they were married, and grew heartily tired 
of each other before many years were over. " Nescio quid 
est materia cum me," Sterne writes to one of his friends 
(in dog Latin, and very sad-dog Latin too) " sed sum fati- 
gatus et segrotus de mea uxore plus quam unquam," which 
means, I am sorry to say, " I don't know what is the mat- 
ter with me : but I am more tired and sick of my wife than 
ever.'" 

This to be sure was five-and-twenty years after Laurey 
had been overcome by her generosity and she by Laurey 's 
love. Then he wrote to her of the delights of marriage, 
saying — " We will be as merry and as innocent as our first 
parents in Paradise : before the arch fiend entered that in- 
describable scene. The kindest affections will have room 
to expand in our retirement — let the human tempest and 
hurricane rage at a distance, the desolation is beyond the 
horizon of peace. My L. has seen a polyanthus blow in 

1 " My wife returns to Toulose, and proposes to pass the summer at Bignadres 

I, on the contrary, go and visit my wife, the church, in Yorkshire. We all live the 
longer, at least the happier, for having thing.s our own way ; this is my conjugal 
maxim. I own 'tis not the best of maxims, but I maintain 'tis not the worst." — 
Sterne's Letters, 20th January, 1764. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 231 



December? — Some friendly wall has sheltered it from the 
biting wind — no planetary influence shall reach us, but that 
which presides and cherishes the sweetest flowers. The 
gloomy family of care and distrust shall be banished from 
our dwelling, guarded by thy kind and tutelar deity, — we 
will sing our choral songs of gratitude and rejoice to the 
end of our pilgrimage. Adieu, my L. Return to one who 
languishes for thy society ! — As I take up my pen, my poor 
pulse quickens, my pale face glows, and tears are trick- 
ling down on my paper as I trace the word L." 

And it is about this woman, with whom he finds no 
fault, but that she bores him, that our philanthropist writes, 
" Sum fatigatus et aegrotus" — Sti7n mortaliter in amore 
with somebody else ! That fine flower of love, that poly- 
anthus over which Sterne snivelled so many tears, could 
not last for a quarter of a century. Or rather it could not 
be supposed that a gentleman with such a fountain at com- 
mand, should keep it to arroser one homely old lady, when 
a score of younger and prettier people might be refreshed 
from the same gushing source.' It was in December, 



* In a collection of " Seven Letters by Stems and his friends" (printed for pri- 
vate circulation), in 1844, is a letter of M. Tollot, who was in France with Sterne 
and his family in 1764. Here is a paragraph : — 

" Nous arrivames le lendemain a Montpellier, oil nous trouvames notre ami Mr. 
Sterne, sa femme, sa fille, Mr. Huet et quelques autres Anglaises ; j'eus, je vous 
I'avoue, beaucoup de plaisir en revoyant le bon et agreable Tristram. ... II avail 
ete assez longtemps k Toulouse, oti il se serait amuse sans sa femme, qui le pour- 
suivit partout, et qui voulait etre de tout. Ces dispositions dans cette bonne dame, 
lui ont fait passer d'assez mauvais momens ; il supporte tous ces desagremens avec 
une patience d'ange." 

About four months after this very characteristic letter, Sterne WTote to the same 
gentleman to whom Tollot had written ; and from his letter we may extract a com 
panion paragraph : — 

. ..." All which being premised, I have been for eight weeks smitten with the 



232 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



1767, that the Rev. Lawrence Sterne, the famous Shan- 
dean, the charming Yorick, the delight of the fashionable 
world, the delicious divine, for whose sermons the whole 
polite world was subscribing,' the occupier of Rabelais's 
easy chair, only fresh stuffed and more elegant than when 



tenderest passion that ever tender wight underwent. I wish, dear cousin, thou 
couldst conceive (perhaps thou canst without my wishing it) how deliciously I can- 
ter'd away with it the first month, two up, two down, always upon my hanchcs 
along the streets from my hotel to hers, at first once — then twice, then three times 
a day, till at length I was within an ace of setting up my hobby-horse in her stable for 
good and all. I might as well, considering how the enemies of the Lord have blas- 
phemed thereupon. The last three weeks we were every hour upon the doleful 
ditty of parting — and thou mayest conceive, dear cousin, how it altered my gait and 
air — for I went and came like any louden'd carl, and did nothing but jouer des sen- 
timens with her from sun-rising even to the setting of the same ; and now she is 
gone to the south of France ; and to finish the comedie, I fell ill, and broke a ves- 
sel in my lungs, and half bled to death. Voil4 mon histoire !" 

Whether husband or wife had most of the "patience (Vange" may be uncertain ; 
but there can be no doubt which needed it most ! 

' " ' Tristram Shandy' is still a greater object of admiration, the man as well as 
the book ; one is invited to dinner, when he dines, a fortnight before. As to the 
volumes yet published, there is much good fun in them, and humour sometimes hit 
and sometimes missed. Have you read his ' Sermons,' with his own comick figure, 
from a painting by Reynolds, at the head of them ? They are in the style I think 
most proper for the pulpit, and show a strong imagination and a sensible heart ; but 
you see him often tottering on the verge of laughter, and ready to throw his periwig 
in the face of the audience." — Gray's Letters, June 22nd, 1760. 

" It having been observed that there was little hospitality in London — Johnson: 
' Nay, Sir, any man who has a name, or who has the power of pleasing, will be very 
generally invited in London. The man, Sterne, I have been told, has had engage- 
ments for three months.' Goldsmith : ' And a very dull fellow.' Johnson : ' Why, 
no. Sir.' " — Boswell's Life of Johnson. 

" Her [Miss Monckton's] vivacity enchanted the sage, and they used to talk to- 
gether with all imaginable ease. A singular instance happened one evening, when 
she insisted that some of Sterne's writings were very pathetic. Johnson bluntly 
denied it. ' I am sure,' said she, ' they have affected me.' ' Why,' said Johnson, 
smiling, and rolling himself about — 'that is, because, dearest, you're a dunce.' 
When she sometime afterwards mentioned this to him, he said with equal truth and 
politeness, ' Madam, if I had thought so, I certainly should not have said it.' " — 
Ibid. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 233 



in possession of the cynical old curate of Meudon," — the 

* A passage or two from Sterne's " Sermons" may not be without interest here. 
Is not the following, levelled against the cruelties of the Church of Rome, stamped 
with the autograph of the author of the " Sentimental Journey ?" — 

" To be convinced of this, go with me for a moment into the prisons of the In- 
quisition — behold religion with mercy and justice chained down imder her feet, — 
there, sitting ghastly upon a black tribunal, propped up with racks and instruments 
of torment. — Hark ! — what a piteous groan ! — See the melancholy wretch who ut- 
tered it, just brought forth to undergo the anguish of a mock-trial, and endure the 
utmost pain that a studied system of religious cruelty has been able to invent. Be- 
hold this helpless victim delivered up to his tormentors. His body so wasted with 
sorrow and long confinement, yoiCll see every nerve and muscle as it suffers. — Observe 
the last movement of that horrid engine. — What convulsions it has thrown him into ! 
Consider the nature of the posture in which he now lies stretched. — What exquis- 
ite torture he endures by it. — 'Tis all nature can bear. — Good God ! see how it 
keeps his weary soul hanging upon his trembling lips, willing to take its leave, but 
not suffered to depart. Behold the imhappy wretch led back to his cell, — dragg'd 
out of it again to meet the flames — and the insults in his last agonies, which this 
principle — this principle, that there can be religion without morality — has prepared 
for him." — Sermon 27th. 

The next extract is preached on a text to be found in Judges xix. ver. 1, 2, 3, 
concerning a " certain Lcvite :" — 

" Such a one the Levite wanted to share his solitude and fill up that uncomfort- 
able blank in the heart in such a situation ; for, notwithstanding all we meet with 
in books, in many of which, no doubt, there are a good many handsome things said 

upon the secrets of retirement, &c yet still, ' it is not good for man to be 

alone :' nor can all which the cold-hearted pedant stuns our ears with upon the sub- 
ject, ever give one answer of satisfaction to the mind ; in the midst of the loudest 
vauntings of philosophy, nature will have her yearnings for society and friendship ; 
— a good heart wants some object to be kind to — and the best parts of our blood, 
and the purest of our spirits, suffer most under the destitution. 

" Let the torpid monk seek Heaven comfortless and alone. God speed him ! 
For my own part, I fear I should never so find the way ; let me be wise and religious, 
but let me be Man ; wherever thy Providence places me, or whatever be the road I 
take to Thee, give me some companion in my journey, be it only to remark to, 
' How our shadows lengthen as our sun goes down ;' — to whom I may say, ' How 
fresh is the face of Nature ! how sweet the flowers of the field ! how delicious are 
these fruits !' " — Sermon I8th. 

The first of these passages gives us another drawing of the famous "Captive." 
The second shows that the same reflection was suggested to the Rev. Lawrence, 
by a text in Judges, as by the fille-de-chambre. 

Sterne's Sermons were published as those of " Mr. Yorick." 



2S4 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

more than rival of the Dean of St. Patrick's, wrote the 
ahove quoted respectable letter to his friend in London ; 
and it was in April of the same year, that he was pouring 
out his fond heart to Mrs. Elizabeth Draper, wife of Daniel 
Draper, Esq., Counsellor of Bombay, and, in 1775, chief 
of the factory of Surat — a gentleman very much respected 
in that quarter of the globe. 

"I got thy letter last night, Eliza," Sterne writes, "on 
my return from Lord Bathurst's, where I dined — (the let- 
ter has this merit in it that it contains a pleasant reminis- 
cence of better men than Sterne, and introduces us to a 
portrait of a kind old gentleman) — I got thy letter last 
night, Eliza, on my return from Lord Bathurst's ; and 
where I was heard — as I talked of thee an hour without 
intermission — with so much pleasure and attention, that 
the good old Lord toasted your health three different times ; 
and now he is in his 85th year, says he hopes to live long 
enough to be introduced as a friend to my fair Indian dis- 
ciple, and to see her eclipse all other Nabobesses as much 
in wealth, as she does already in exterior, and what is far 
better (for Sterne is nothing without his morality), and 
what is far better, in interior merit. This nobleman is an 
old friend of mine. You know he was always the protect- 
or of men of wit and genius, and has had those of the last 
century, Addison, Steele, Pope, Swift, Prior, &c., always 
at his table. The manner in which his notice began of 
me was as singular as it was polite. He came up to me 
one day as I was at the Princess of Wales's court, and said, 
' I v.-ant to know you, Mr. Sterne, but it is fit you also 
should know who it is that wishes thii? pleasure. You 
have heard of an old Lord Bathurst, of whom your Popes 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 235 

and Swifts have sung and spoken so much ? I have lived 
my life with geniuses of that cast ; but have survived 
them ; and, despairing ever to find their equals, it is some 
years since I have shut up my books and closed my ac- 
counts ; but you have kindled a desire in me of opening 
them once more before I die so : which I now do : so go 
home and dine with me.' This nobleman, I say, is a prod- 
igy, for he has all the wit and promptness of a man of 
thirty ; a disposition to be pleased, and a power to please 
others, beyond whatever I knew ; added to which a man 
of learning, courtesy, and feeling." 

" He heard me talk of thee, Eliza, with uncommon sat- 
isfaction — for there was only a third person, and of sensi- 
bility, with us : and a most sentimental afternoon till nine 
o'clock have we passed !' But thou, Eliza ! wert the star 
that conducted and enlivened the discourse ! And when I 
talked not of thee, still didst thou fill my mind, and warm 
every thought I uttered, for I am not ashamed to acknowl- 
edge I greatly miss thee. Best of all good girls ! — the suf- 
ferings I have sustained all night in consequence of thine. 



* " I am glad that you are in love — 'twill cure you at least of the spleen, which has 
a bad effect on both man and woman — I myself must even have some Dulcinea in 
my head, it harmonises the soul ; and in these cases I first endeavour to make the 
lady believe so, or rather, I begin first to make myself believe that I am in love — 
but I carry on my affairs quite in the French way, sentimentally — I'amour (say they) 
n'est rien sans sentiment. Now, notwithstanding they make such a pother about the 
word, they have no precise idea annexed to it. And so much for that same subject 
called love." — Sterne's Letters, May 23, 1765. 

" P.S. — My ' Sentimental Journey' will please Mrs. J and my Lydia [his 

daughter, afterwards Mrs. Medalle] — I can answer for those two. It is a subject 
which works well, and suits the frame of mind I have been in for some time past. 
1 told you my design in it was to teach us to love the world and our fellow-creat- 
ures better than we do — so it runs most upon those gentler passions and affections 
•which aid so much to it." — Letters [1767]. 



236 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Eliza, are beyond the power of words And so thou 

hast fixed thy Bramin's portrait over thy writing desk, and 
will consult it in all doubts and difficulties ? — Grrateful and 
good girl ! Yorick smiles contentedly over all thou dost : 
his picture does not do justice to his own complacency. I 
am glad your shipmates are friendly beings (Eliza was at 
Deal going back to the Counsellor at Bombay, and indeed 
it was high time she should be off). You could least dis- 
pense with what is contrary to your own nature, which is 
soft and gentle, Eliza ; it would civilise savages — ^though 
pity were it thou shouldest be tainted with the office. Write 
to me, my child, thy delicious letters. Let them speak the 
easy carelessness of a heart that opens itself anyhow, every 
how, such Eliza I write to thee ! (the artless rogue, of 
course he did !) 'And so I should ever love thee, most art- 
lessly, most affectionately if Providence permitted thy resi- 
dence in the same section of the globe : for I am all that 
honour and affection can make me ' Thy Bramin.' " 

The Bramin continues addressing Mrs, Draper until the 
departure of the Eai'l of Chatham, Indiaman, from Deal, 
on the 2nd of April, 1767. He is amiably anxious about 
the fresh paint for Eliza's cabin ; he is uncommonly solic- 
itous about her companions on board : "I fear the best of 
your shipmates are only genteel by comparison with the 
contrasted crew with which thou beholdest them. So was 
— you know who — from the same fallacy which was put 
upon your judgment when — but I will not mortify you I" 

" You know who" was, of course, Daniel Draper, Esq., 
of Bombay — a gentleman very much respected in that quar- 
ter of the globe, and about whose probable health our wor- 
thy Bramin writes with delightful candour. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 237 

" I honour you, Eliza, for keeping secret some things 
which, if explained, had been a panegyric on yourself. 
There is a dignity in venerable affliction which will not al- 
low it to appeal to the world for pity or redress. "Well have 
you supported that character, my amiable, my philosophic 
friend ! And indeed, I begin to think you have as many 
virtues as my Uncle Toby's widow. Talking of widows — 
pray, Eliza, if ever you are such, do not think of giving 
yourself to some wealthy Nabob, because I design to mar- 
ry you myself. My wife cannot live long, and I know not 
the woman I should like so well for her substitute as your- 
self. 'Tis true I am ninety-five in constitution, and you 
but twenty-five ; but what I want in youth, I will make 
up in wit and good-humour. Not Swift so loved his Stel- 
la, Scarron his Maintenon, or "Waller his Saccharissa. Tell 
me, in answer to this, that you approve and honour the 
proposal." 

Approve and honour the proposal ! The coward was 
writing gay letters to his friends this while, with sneering 
allusions to this poor foolish Bramine. Her ship was not 
out of the Downs, and the charming Sterne was at the 
Mount Coffee-house, with a sheet of gilt-edged paper before 
him, offering that precious treasure his heart to Lady 
P , asking whether it gave her pleasure to see him un- 
happy ? whether it added to her triumph that her eyes and 
lips had turned a man into a fool ? — quoting the Lord's 
Prayer, with a horrible baseness of blasphemy, as a proof 
that he had desired not to be led into temptation, and 
swearing himself the most tender and sincere fool in the 
world. It was from his home at Coxwould that he wrote 
the Latin letter, which, I suppose, he was ashamed to put 



238 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

into English. I find in my copy of the Letters, that there 
is a note of I cannot call it admiration, at letter 112, which 
seems to announce that there was a No. 3 to whom the 
wretched worn-out old scamp was paying his addresses ;' 
and the year after, having come back to his lodgings in 
Bond-street, with his " Sentimental Journey" to launch 
upon the town, eager as ever for praise and pleasure ; as 
vain, as wicked, as witty, as false as he had ever been, 
death at length seized the feeble wretch, and, on the 18th 
of March, 1768, that " bale of cadaverous goods," as he 
calls his body, was consigned to Pluto.'' In his last letter 
there is one sign of grace — the real affection with which 



' TO MRS. H , 

" Coxwould, Nov. 15, 1767. 

" Now be a good dear woman, my H , and execute those commissions well, 

and when I see you I will give you a kiss — there's for you ! But I have something 
else for you which I am fabricating at a great rate, and that is my ' Sentimental 
Journey,' which shall make you cry as much as it has affected me, or I will give 

up the business of sentimental writing 

" I am yours, &c., &c., 

" T. Shandy." 

TO THE EARL OF . 

" Coxtvotild, Nov. 28, 1767. 

" My Lord, — 'Tis with the greatest pleasure I take my pen to thank your Lord- 
ship for your letter of inquiry about Yorick — he was worn out, both his spirits and 
body, with the ' Sentimental Journey ;' 'tis true, then, an author must feel himself, 
or his reader will not — but I have torn my whole frame into pieces by my feelings — 
I believe the brain stands as much in need of recruiting as the body ; therefore I 
shall set out for town the twentieth of next month, after having recruited myself a 
week at York. I might indeed solace myself with my wife (who is come from 
France), but in fact, I have long been a sentimental being, whatever your Lordship 
may think to the contrary." 

2 " It is known that Sterne died in hired lodgings, and I have been told that his 
attendants robbed him even of his gold sleeve-buttons while he was expiring." — Dk. 
Ferriar. 

He died at No. 41 (now a cheesemonger's), on the west side of Old Bond-street. 
— Handbook of London. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 239 

he entreats a friend to be a guardian to his daughter 
Lydia.' All his letters to her are artless, kind, affection- 
ate, and not sentimental ; as a hundred pages in his writ- 
ings are beautiful, and full, not of suprising humour mere- 
ly, but of genuine love and kindness. A perilous trade, 
indeed, is that of a man who has to bring his tears and 
laughter, his recollections, his personal griefs and joys, his 
private thoughts and feelings to market, to write them on 
paper, and sell them for money. Does he exaggerate his 
grief, so as to get his reader's pity for a false sensibility — 
feign indignation, so as to establish a character for virtue ? 
elaborate repartees, so that he may pass for a wit ? steal 
from other authors, and put down the theft to the credit 
side of his own reputation for ingenuity and learning ? 
feign originality ? affect benevolence or misanthropy ? ap- 
peal to the gallery gods with claptraps and vulgar baits to 
catch applause ? How much of the paint and emphasis is 
necessary for the fair business of the stage, and how much 
of the rant and rouge is put on for the vanity of the actor. 



* " In February, 1768, Lawrence Sterne, his frame exhausted by long debilitating 
illness, expired at his lodgings in Bond-street, London. There was something in 
the manner of his death singularly resembling the particulars detailed by Mrs. 
Quickly, as attending that of Falstaff, the compeer of Yorick for infinite jest, how- 
ever unlike in other particulars. As he lay on his bed totally exhausted, he com- 
plained that his feet were cold, and requested the female attendant to chafe them. 
She did so, and it seemed to relieve him. He complained that the cold came up 
higher ; and whilst the assistant was in the act of chafing his ancles and legs, he 
expired without a groan. It was also remarkable that his death took place much in 
the manner which he himself had wished; and that the last offices were rendered 
him, not in his own house, or by the hand of kindred affection, but in an inn, and 
by strangers. 

" W^e are well acquainted with Sterne's features and personal appearance, to 
which he himself frequently alludes. He was tall and thin, with a hectic and con- 
sumptive appearance." — Sir Walter Scott. 



240 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



His audience trusts him: can he trust himself? How 
much was deliberate calculation and imposture — how much 
was false sensibility — and how much true feeling? Where 
did the lie begin, and did he know where ? and where did 
the truth end in the art and scheme of this man of genius, 
this actor, this quack ? Some time since I was in the 
company of a French actor, who began after dinner, and 
at his own request, to sing French songs of the sort called 
des chansons grivoises, and which he performed admi- 
rably, and to the dissatisfaction of most persons present. 
Having finished these, he commenced a sentimental bal- 
lad — it was so charmingly sung that it touched all persons 
present, and especially the singer himself, whose voice 
trembled, whose eyes filled with emotion, and who was 
snivelling and weeping quite genuine tears by the time his 
own ditty was over. I suppose Sterne had this artistical 
sensibility ; he used to blubber perpetually in his study, 
and finding his tears infectious, and that they brought him 
a great popularity, he exercised the lucrative gift of weep- 
ing, he utilised it, and cried on every occasion. I own that 
I do not value or respect much the cheap dribble of those 
fountains. He fatigues me with his perpetual disquiet 
and his uneasy appeals to my risible or sentimental facul- 
ties. He is always looking in my face, watching his effect, 
uncertain whether I think him an impostor or not ; post- 
ure-making, coaxing, and imploring me. " See what sens- 
ibility I have — own now that I'm very clever — do cry 
now, you can't resist this." The humour of Swift and 
Rabelais, whom he pretended to succeed, poured from them 
as naturally as a song does from a bird ; they lose no man- 
ly dignity with it, but laugh their hearty great laugh out 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 241 

of their broad chests as nature bade them. But this man 
— who can make you laugh, who can make you cry, too 
— never lets his reader alone, or will permit his audience 
repose : when you are quiet, he fancies he must rouse you, 
and turns over head and heels, or sidles up and whispers a 
nasty story. The man is a great jester, not a great hu- 
mourist. He goes to work systematically and of cold 
blood ; paints his face, puts on his ruff and motley clothes, 
and lays down his carpet and tumbles on it. 

For instance, take the " Sentimental Journey," and see 
in the writer the deliberate propensity to make points and 
seek applause. He gets to Dessein's Hotel, he wants a 
carriage to travel to Paris, he goes to the inn-yard and be- 
gins what the actors call " business" at once. There is 
that little carriage the dcsobligeant. " Four months had 
elapsed since it had finished its career of Europe in the 
corner of Monsieur Dessein's court-yard, and having sallied 
out thence but a vamped-up business at first, though it had 
been twice taken to pieces on Mount Sennis, it had not 
profited much by its adventures, but by none so little as 
the standing so many months unpitied in the corner of 
Monsieur Dessein's coach-yard. Much, indeed, was not to 
be said for it — but something might — and when a few 
words will rescue misery out of her distress, I hate the man 
who can be a churl of them." 

Le tour est fait I Paillasse has tumbled ! Paillasse has 
jumped over the desobligeant, cleared it, hood and all, and 
bows to the noble company. Does anybody believe that 
this is a real Sentiment ? that this luxury of generosity, 
this gallant rescue of Misery (with a large M) — out of an 
qld cab, is genuine feeling ? It is as genuine as the virtu- 

L 



242 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ous oratory of Joseph Surface when he begins, " The man 
who," &c., &c., and wishes to pass off for a saint with his 
credulous, good-humoured dupes. 

Our friend purchases the carriage — after turning that 
notorious old monk to good account, and effecting (like a 
soft and good-natured Paillasse as he was, and very free 
with his money when he had it) an exchange of snuff-box- 
es with the old Franciscan, jogs out of Calais ; sets down 
in immense figures on the credit side of his account the sous 
he gives away to the Montreuil beggars ; and, at Nampont, 
gets out of the chaise and whimpers over that famous dead 
donkey, for which any sentimentalist may cry who will. 
It is agreeably and skilfully done — that dead jackass; 
like M. de Soubise's cook, on the campaign, Sterne dresses 
it, and serves it up quite tender and with a very piquante 
sauce. But tears, and fine feelings, and a white pocket- 
handkerchief, and a funeral sermon, and horses and feath- 
ers, and a procession of mutes, and a hearse with a dead 
donkey inside ! Psha ! Mountebank ! Pll not give thee 
one penny more for that trick, donkey and all! 

This donkey had appeared once before with signal effect. 
In 1765, three years before the publication of the " Senti- 
mental Journey," the seventh and eighth volumes of " Tris- 
tram Shandy" were given to the world, and the famous 
Lyons donkey makes his entry in those volumes (pp. 315, 
316):— 

" 'Twas but a poor ass, with a couple of large panniers 
at his back, who had just turned in to collect eleemosynary 
turnip-tops and cabbage-leaves ; and stood dubious, with 
his two fore-feet at the inside of the threshold, and with 
his two hinder feet towards the street, as not knowing very 
well whether he was to go in or no. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 243 

" Now 'tis an animal (be in what hurry I may) I can- 
not bear to strike ; there is a patient endurance of suffering 
wrote so unaffectedly in his loolcs and carriage which pleads 
so mightily for him, that it always disarms me, and to that 
degree that I do not like to speak unkindly to him : on the 
contrary, meet him where I will, whether in town or coun- 
try, in cart or under panniers, whether in liberty or bond- 
age, I have ever something civil to say to him on my part ; 
and, as one word begets another (if he has as little to do as 
I), I generally fall into conversation with him ; and surely 
never is my imagination so busy as in framing responses 
from the etchings of his countenance ; and where those 
carry me not deep enough, in flying from my own heart 
into his, and seeing what is natural for an ass to think — 
as well as a man, upon the occasion. In truth, it is the 
only creature of all the classes of beings below me with 

whom I can do this With an ass I can commune 

for ever. 

" ' Come, Honesty,' said I, seeing it was impracticable 
to pass betwixt him and the gate, ' art thou for coming in 
or going out ?' 

" The ass twisted his head round to look up the street. 

" 'Well!' replied I, 'we'll wait a minute for thy driver.' 

" He turned his head thoughtful about, and looked wist- 
fully the opposite way. 

'"I understand thee perfectly,' answered I: 'if thou 
takest a wrong step in this affair, he will cudgel thee to 
death. Well ! a minute is but a minute ; and if it saves 
a fellow-creature a drubbing, it shall not be set down as 
ill spent.' 

"He was eating the stem of an artichoke as this dis- 



■!^KS,\'. 



244 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



course went on, and, in the little peevish contentions be- 
tween hunger and unsavouriness, had dropped it out of his 
mouth half a dozen times, and had picked it up again. 
' God help thee. Jack !' said I, ' thou hast a bitter breakfast 
on't — and many a bitter day's labour, and many a bitter 
blow, I fear, for its wages ! 'Tis all, all bitterness to thee — 
whatever life is to others ! And now thy mouth, if one 
knew the truth of it, is as bitter, I dare say, as soot (for he 
had cast aside the stem), and thou hast not a friend perhaps 
in all this world that will give thee a macaroon.' In saying 
this, I pulled out a paper of 'em, which I had just bought, 
and gave him one ; — and, at this moment that I am telling 
it, my heart smites me that there was more of pleasantry 
in the conceit of seeing how an ass would eat a macaroon 
than of benevolence in giving him one, which presided in 
the act. 

" When the ass had eaten his macaroon, I pressed him 
to come in. The poor beast vras heavily loaded — ^his legs 
seemed to tremble under him — he hung rather backwards, 
and, as I pulled at his halter, it broke in my hand. He 
looked up pensive in my face : ' Don't thrash me with it ; 
but if you will, you may.' ' If I do,' said I, ' I'll be d .' " 

A critic who refuses to see in this charming description 
wit, humour, pathos, a kind nature speaking, and a real 
sentiment, must be hard indeed to move and to please. A 
page or two farther we come to a description not less beau- 
tiful — a landscape and figures, deliciously painted by one 
who had the keenest enjoyment and the most tremulous 
sensibility : — 

" 'Twas in the road between Nismes and Lunel, where 
is the best Muscatto wine in all France : the sun was set, 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 245 



they had done their work ; the nymphs had tied up their 
hair afresh, and the swains were preparing for a carousal. 
My mule made a dead point. ' 'Tis the pipe and tambour- 
ine,' said I — ' I never will argue a point with one of your 
family as long as I live ;' so leaping off his hack, and kick- 
ing off one boot into this ditch and t'other into that, ' I'll 
take a dance,' said I, ' so stay you here.' 

" A sun-burnt daughter of labour rose up from the group 
to meet me as I advanced towards them ; her hair, which 
was of a dark chesnut approaching to a black, was tied up 
in a knot, all but a single tress. 

" ' We want a cavalier,' said she, holding out both her 
hands, as if to offer them. ' And a cavalier you shall have,' 
said I, taking hold of both of them. ' We could not have 
done without you,' said she, letting go one hand, with self- 
taught politeness, and leading me up with the other. 

" A lame youth, whom Apollo had recompensed with a 
pipe, and to which he had added a tambourine of his own 
accord, ran sweetly over the prelude, as he sat upon the 
bank. ' Tie me up this tress, instantly,' said Nannette, 
putting a piece of string into my hand. It taught me to 
forget I was a stranger. The whole knot fell down — we 
had been seven years acquainted. The youth struck the 
note upon the tambourine, his pipe followed, and off we 
bounded. 

" The sister of the youth — who had stolen her voice from 
Heaven — sang alternately with her brother. 'Twas a Gas- 
coigne roundelay. ' Viva la joia, fidon la tristessa ;' — 
the nymphs joined in unison, and their swains an octave 
below them. 

" Viva la joia was in Nannette's lips, viva la joia in 



246 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

her eyes. A transient spark of amity shot across the space 
betwixt us. She looked amiable. Why could I not live and 
end my days thus? ' Just Disposer of our joys and sor- 
rows !' cried I, ' why could not a man sit down in the lap 
of content here, and dance, and sing, and say his prayers, 
and go to Heaven with this nut-brown maid ?' Capri- 
ciously did she bend her head on one side, and dance up 
insidious. ' Then 'tis time to dance off,' quoth I." 

And with this pretty dance and chorus, the volume art- 
fully concludes. Even here one cannot give the whole de- 
scription. There is not a page in Sterne's writing but has 
something that were better away, a latent corruption — a 
hint, as of an impure presence.^ 

Some of that dreary double entendre may be attributed 

' " With regard to Sterne, and the charge of licentiousness which presses so se- 
riously upon his character as a writer, I would remark that there is a sort of know- 
ingness, the wit of which depends, 1st, on the modesty it gives pain to ; or, 2ndly, 
on the innocence and innocent ignorance over which it triumphs ; or, 3rdly, on a 
certain oscillation in the individual's own mind between the remaining good and the 
encroaching evil of his nature — a sort of dallying with the devil — a fluxionary art of 
combining courage and cowardice, as when a man snuffs a candle with his fingers for 
the first time, or better still, perhaps, like that trembling daring with which a child 
touches a hot tea-urn, because it has been forbidden ; so that the mind has its own 
white and black angel ; the same or similar amusement as may be supposed to take 
place between an old debauchee and a prude, — the feeling resentment, on the one 
hand, from a prudential anxiety to preserve appearances and have a character ; and, 
on the other, an inward sympathy with the enemy. We have only to suppose so- 
ciety innocent, and then nine-tenths of this sort of wit would be like a stone that 
falls in snow, making no sound, because exciting no resistance ; the remainder rests 
on its being an offence against the good manners of human nature itself. 

" This source, unworthy as it is, may doubtless be combined with wit, drollery, 
fancy, and even humour ; and we have only to regret the misalliance ; but that the 
latter are quite distinct from the former, may be made evident by abstracting in our 
imagination the morality of the characters of Mr. Shandy, my Uncle Toby, and 
Trim, which are all antagonists to this spurious sort of wit, from the rest of ' Tris- 
tram Shandy,' and by supposing, instead of them, the presence of two or three cal- 
lous debauchees. The result will be pure disgust. Sterne cannot be too severely 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 247 

to freer times and manners than ours, but not all. The 
foul Satyr's eyes leer out of the leaves constantly : the last 
words the famous author wrote were bad and wicked — the 
last lines the poor stricken wretch penned were for pity 
and pardon. I think of these past writers and of one who 
lives amongst us now, and am grateful for the innocent 
laughter and the sweet and unsullied page which the au- 
thor of " David Copperfield" gives to my children. 

" Jete sur cette boule, 

Laid, chetif et souffrant ; 
*Etouffe dans la foule, 

Faute d'etre assez grand ; 
" Une plainte touchante 

De ma bouche sortit ; 

Le bon Dieu me dit : Chante, 

Chante, pauvre petit ! 
" Chanter, ou je m'abuse, 

Est ma tache ici has, 

Tous ceux qu'ainsi j'amuse, 

Ne m'aimeront-ils pas ?"' 



censured for thus using the best dispositions of our nature as the panders and con- 
diments for the basest." — Colkridge. Literary Remains, vol. i. p. 141, 142. 
1 A castaway on this great earth, 
A sickly child of humble birth 

And homely feature ; 
Before me rushed the swift and strong, 
I thought to perish in the throng, 
Poor puny creature. 

Then crying in my loneliness, 

I prayed that Heaven in my distress 

Some aid would bring, 
And pitying my misery. 
My guardian angel said to me. 

Sing, poet, sing. 

Since then my grief is not so sharp, 
I know my lot and tune my harp, 
And chant my ditty ; 



248 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

In those charming lines of Beranger, one may fancy de- 
scribed the career, the sufferings, the genius, the gentle 
nature of Gtoldsmith, and the esteem in which we hold 
him. Who, of the millions whom he has amused, does not 
love him ? To be the most beloved of English writers, 
what a title that is for a man !' A wild youth, wayward 
but full of tenderness and affection, quits the country vil- 
lage where his boyhood has been passed in happy musing, 
in idle shelter, in fond longing to see the great world out 
of doors, and achieve name and fortune — and after years 
of dire struggle, and neglect and poverty, his heart turning 
back as fondly to his native place, as it had longed eagerly 
for change when sheltered there, he writes a book and a 
poem, full of the recollections and feelings of home — he 
paints the friends and scenes of his youth, and peoples Au- 
burn and "Wakefield with remembrances of Lissoy. Wan- 
der he must, but he carries away a home-relic with him, 
and dies with it on his breast. His nature is truant; in 
repose it longs for change : as on the journey it looks back 
for friends and quiet. He passes to-day in building an air 



And kindly voices cheer the bard, 
And gentle hearts his song reward 
With love and pity. 
' " He was a friend to virtue, and in his most playful pages never forgets what 
is due to it. A gentleness, delicacy, and purity of feeling distinguishes whatever 
he wrote, and bears a correspondence to the generosity of a disposition which knew 

no bounds but his last guinea 

" The admirable ease and grace of the narrative, as well as the pleasing truth 
with which the principal characters are designed, make the ' Vicar of Wakefield' 
one of the most delicious morsels of fictitious composition on which the human mind 
was ever employed. 

. . . . " We read the ' Vicar of Wakefield' in youth and in age— we return to it 
again and again, and bless the memory of an author who contrives so well to recon- 
cile us to human nature." — Sir Walter Scott. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 249 

castle for to-morrow, or in writing yesterday's elegy ; and 
he would fly away this hour ; but that a cage necessity 
keeps him. What is the charm of his verse, of his style, 
and humour ? His sweet regrets, his delicate compassion, 
his soft smile, his tremulous sympathy, the weakness which 
he owns? Your love for him is half pity. You come hot 
and tired from the day's battle, and this sweet minstrel 
sings to you. Who could harm the kind vagrant harper ? 
Whom did he ever hurt ? He carries no weapon — save the 
harp on which he plays to you ; and with which he delights 
great and humble, young and old, the Captains in the tents, 
or the soldiers round the fire, or the women and children 
in the villages, at whose porches he stops and sings his sim- 
ple songs of love and beauty. With that sweet story of 
the " Vicar of Wakefield,'" he has found entry into every 



1 " Now Herder came," says Goethe in his Autobiography, relating his first ac- 
quaintance with Goldsmith's masterpiece, " and together with his great knowledge 
brought many other aids, and the later publications besides. Among these he an- 
nounced to us the ' Vicar of Wakefield' as an excellent work, with the German 
translation of which he would make us acquainted by reading it aloud to us him- 
self. .... 

" A Protestant country clergyman is perhaps the most beautiful subject for a mod- 
em idyl ; he appears like Melchizedeck, as priest and king in one person. To the 
most innocent situation which can be imagined on earth, to that of a husbandman, 
he is, for the most part, united by similarity of occupation as well as by equality in 
family relationships ; he is a father, a master of a family, an agriculturist, and thus 
perfectly a member of the community. On this pure, beautiful, earthly foundation 
rests his higher calling ; to him is it given to guide men through life, to take care 
of their spiritual education, to bless them at all the leading epochs of their exist- 
ence, to instruct, to strengthen, to console them, and if consolation is not sufficient 
for the present, to call up and guarantee the hope of a happier future. Imagine such 
a man with pure human sentiments, strong enough not to deviate from them under 
any circumstances, and by this already elevated above the multitude of whom one 
cannot expect purity and firmness ; give him the learning necessary for his office, 
as well as a cheerful, equable activity, which is even passionate, as it neglects no 
moment to do good — and you will have him well endowed. But at the same time 

L 2 



250 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

castle and every hamlet in Europe. Not one of us, how- 
ever busy or hard, but once or twice in our lives, has passed 

add the necessary limitation, so that he must not only pause in a small circle, but 
may also perchance pass over to a smaller ; grant him good-nature, placability, res- 
olution, and everything else praiseworthy that springs from a decided character, 
and over all this a cheerful spirit of compliance, and a smiling toleration of his own 
failings and those of others, — then you will have put together pretty well the image 
of our excellent Wakefield. 

"The delineation of this character on his course of life through joys and sorrows, 
the ever-increasing interest of the story, by the combination of the entirely natural 
with the strange and the singular, make this novel one of the best which has ever 
been written ; besides this, it has the great advantage that it is quite moral, nay, in 
a pure sense. Christian — represents the reward of a good-will and perseverance in 
the right, strengthens an unconditional confidence iu God, and attests the final tri- 
umph of good over evil ; and all this without a trace of cant or pedantry. The 
author was preserved from both of these by an elocution of mind that shows itself 
throughout in the form of irony, by which this little work must appear to us as wise 
as it is amiable. The author. Dr. Goldsmith, has without question a great insight 
into the moral world, into its strength and its infirmities ; but at the same time he 
can thankfully acknowledge that he is an Englishman, and reckon highly the ad- 
vantages which his country and his nation afford him. The family, with the deline- 
ation of which he occupies himself, stands upon one of the last steps of citizen com- 
fort, and yet comes in contact with the highest ; its narrow circle, which becomes 
still more contracted, touches upon the great world through the natural and civil 
course of things ; this little skiff floats on the agitated waves of English life, and in 
weal or woe it has to expect injury or help from the vast fleet which sails around it. 

" I may suppose that my readers know this work, and have it in memory ; who- 
ever hears it named for the first time here, as well as he who is induced to read it 
again, will thank me." — Goethe. Truth and Poetry ; from my own Life. (En- 
glish translation, vol. i. pp. 378, 9.) 

" He seems from infancy to have been compounded of two natures, one bright, 
the other blundering ; or to have had fairy gifts laid in his cradle by the ' good peo- 
ple' who haunted his birth-place, the old goblin mansion, on the banks of the Inny. 

" He carries with him the wayward elfin spirit, if we may so term it, throughout 
his career. His fairy gifts are of no avail at school, academy, or college : they un- 
fit him for close study and practical science, and render him heedless of everything 
that does not address itself to his poetical imagination, and genial and festive feel- 
ings ; they dispose him to break away from restraint, to stroll about hedges, green 
lanes, and haunted streams, to revel with jovial companions, or to rove the country 
like a gipsy in quest of odd adventures 

" Though his circumstances often compelled him to associate with the poor, they 
never could betray him into companionship with the depraved. His relish for hu- 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 251 

an evening with him, and undergone the charm of his de- 
lightful music. 

Groldsmith's father was no doubt the good Doctor Prim- 
rose, whom we all of us know/ Swift was yet alive, when 
the little Oliver was born at Pallas, or Pallasmore, in the 
county of Longford, in Ireland. In 1730, two years after 
the child's birth, Charles Groldsmith removed his family to 
Lissoy, in the county Westmeath, that sweet "Auburn," 
which every person who hears me has seen in fancy. Here 
the kind parson^ brought up his eight children ; and loving 
all the world, as his son says, fancied all the world loved 



mour, and for the study of character, as we have before observed, brought him often 
into convivial company of a vulgar kind ; but he discriminated between their vul- 
garity and their amusing qualities, or rather wrought from the whole store familiar 
features of life which form the staple of his most popular writings." — Washington 
Irving. 

* " The family of Goldsmith, Goldsmyth, or as it was occasionally written Gould- 
smith, is of considerable standing in Ireland, and seems always to have held a re- 
spectable station in society. Its origin is English, supposed to be derived from that 
which was long settled at Crayford in Kent." — Prior's Life of Goldsmith. 

Oliver's father, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather were clergymen; 
and two of them married clergymen's daughters. 

* " At church with meek and unaffected grace, 
His looks adorn 'd the venerable place ; 
Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway, 
And fools who came to scoff remain'd to pray. 
The service past, around the pious man. 
With steady zeal each honest rustic ran ; 
E'en children follow'd with endearing wile, 
And pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile. 
His ready smile a parent's warmth exprest. 
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest ; 
To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given, 
But all his serious thoughts had rest in Heaven. 
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form. 
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm. 
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, 
Eternal sunshine settles on its head." — The Deserted Village. 



252 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

him. He had a crowd of poor dependents besides those 
hungry children. He kept an open table ; round which sate 
flatterers and poor friends, who laughed at the honest rec- 
tor's many jokes, and ate the produce of his seventy acres of 
farm. Those who have seen an Irish house in the present 
day, can fancy that one of Lissoy. The old beggar still 
has his allotted corner by the kitchen turf; the maimed 
old soldier still gets his potatoes and butter-milk ; the poor 
cottier still asks his honour's charity, and prays G-od bless 
his E-everence for the sixpence : the ragged pensioner still 
takes his place by right and sufferance. There is still a 
crowd in the kitchen, and a crowd round the parlour-table, 
profusion, confusion, kindness, poverty. If an Irishman 
comes to London to make his fortune, he has a half dozen 
of Irish dependents who take a per centage of his earnings. 
The good Charles Goldsmith' left but little provision for his 
hungry race when death summoned him : and, one of his 
daughters being engaged to a Squire of rather superior dig- 



' " In May this year (1768), he lost his brother, the Rev. Henrj' Goldsmith, for 

whom he had been unable to obtain preferment in the church 

"To the curacy of Kilkenny West, the moderate stipend of which, forty 

pounds a year, is sufficiently celebrated by his brother's lines. It has been stated 
that Mr. Goldsmith added a school, which, after having been held at more than one 
place in the vicinity, was finally fixed at Lissoy. Here his talents and industry 
gave it celebrity, and under his care the sons of many of the neighbouring gentry 
received their education. A fever breaking out among the boys about 1765, they 
dispersed for a time, but re-assembling at Athlone, he continued his scholastic la- 
bours there until the time of his death, which happened, like that of his brother, 
about the forty -fifth year of his age. He was a man of an excellent heart and an 
amiable disposition." — Prior's Goldsmith. 

" Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, 
My heart, untravcll'd, fondly turns to thee : 
Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain, 
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain." 

The Traveller. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 253 

nity, Charles Goldsmith impoverished the rest of his family 
to provide the girl with a dowry. 

The small-pox, which scourged all Europe at that time, 
and ravaged the roses off the cheeks of half the world, fell 
foul of poor little Oliver's face when the child was eight 
years old, and left him scarred and disfigured for his life. 
An old woman in his father's village taught him his letters, 
and pronounced him a dunce : Paddy Byrne, the hedge- 
schoolmaster, took him in hand ; and from Paddy Byrne, 
he was transmitted to a clergyman at Elphin. When a 
child was sent to school in those days, the classic phrase 
was that he was placed under Mr. So and So's ferule. 
Poor little ancestors ! It is hard to think how ruthlessly 
you were birched ; and how much of needless whipping 
and tears our small forefathers had to undergo ! A relative, 
kind uncle Contarine, took the main charge of little Noll ; 
who went through his school-days righteously, doing as lit- 
tle work as he could : robbing orchards, playing at ball, 
and making his pocket-money fly about whenever fortune 
sent it to him. Everybody knows the story of that famous 
" Mistake of a Night," when the young school-boy, provided 
with a guinea and a nag, rode up to the " best house" in 
Ardagh, called for the landlord's company over a bottle of 
wine at supper, and for a hot cake for breakfast in the 
morning ; and found when he asked for the bill, that the 
best house was Squire Featherstone's, and not the inn for 
which he mistook it. Who does not know every story about 
Goldsmith ? That is a delightful and fantastic picture of 
the child dancing and capering about in the kitchen at 
home, when the old fiddler gibed at him for his ugliness — 
and called him .^sop, and little Noll made his repartee of 



254 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

" Heralds proclaim aloud this saying — see Msop dancing 
and his monkey playing." One can fancy the queer pitiful 
look of humour and appeal upon that little scarred face — 
the funny little dancing figure, the funny little brogue. In 
his life, and his writings, which are the honest expression 
of it, he is constantly bewailing that homely face and per- 
son ; anon he surveys them in the glass ruefully ; and pres- 
ently assumes the most comical dignity. He likes to deck 
out his little person in splendour and fine colours. He pre- 
sented himself to be examined for ordination in a pair of 
scarlet breeches, and said honestly that he did not like to 
go into the church because he was fond of coloured clothes. 
When he tried to practise as a doctor, he got by hook or by 
crook a black-velvet suit, and looked as big and grand as 
he could, and kept his hat over a patch on the old coat : in 
better days he bloomed out in plum-colour, in blue silk, 
and in new velvet. For some of those splendours the heirs 
of Mr. Filby, the tailor, have never been paid to this day ; 
perhaps the kind tailor and his creditor have met and set- 
tled the little account in Hades.* 

They showed until lately a window at Trinity College, 
Dublin, on which the name of 0. G-oldsmith was engraved 
with a diamond. Whose diamond was it ? Not the young 
Sizar's, who made but a poor figure in that place of learn- 
ing. He was idle, penniless, and fond of pleasure :' he 



* " When Goldsmith died, half the unpaid bill he owed to Mr. William Filby 
(amounting in all to 791.) was for clothes supplied to this nephew Hodson." — For- 
STER's Goldsmith, p. 520. 

As this nephew Hodson ended his days (see the same page) " a prosperous Irish 
gentleman," it is not unreasonable to wish that he had cleared oflF Mr. Filby's bill. 

' " Poor fellow ! He hardly knew an ass from a mule, nor a turkey from a goose, 
but when he saw it on the table." — Cumberland's Memoirs. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 255 

learned his way early to the pawnbroker's shop. He wrote 
ballads they say for the street singers, who paid him a crown 
for a poem : and his pleasure was to steal out at night and 
hear his verses sung. He was chastised by his tutor for 
giving a dance in his rooms, and took the box on the ear 
so much to heart, that he packed up his all, pawned his 
books and little property, and disappeared from college and 
family. He said he intended to go to America, but when 
his money was spent, the young prodigal came home rue- 
fully, and the good folks there killed their calf — it was but 
a lean one — and welcomed him back. 

After College, he hung about his mother's house, and 
lived for some years the life of a buckeen — passed a month 
with this relation and that, a year with one patron, a great 
deal of time at the public-house.' Tired of this life, it was 
resolved that he should go to London, and study at the 
Temple ; but he got no farther on the road to London and 
the woolsack than Dublin, where he gambled away the 
fifty pounds given him for his outfit, and whence he re- 
turned to the indefatigable forgiveness of home. Then he 
determined to be a doctor, and uncle Contarine helped him 
to a couple of years at Edinburgh. Then from Edinburgh 
he felt that he ought to hear the famous professors of Ley- 
den and Paris, and wrote most amusing pompous letters to 
his uncle about the great Farheim, Du Petit, and Duhamel 
du Monceau, whose lectures he proposed to follow. If 



• " These youthful follies, like the fermentation of liquors, often disturbed the 
mind only in order to its future refinement : a life spent in phlegmatic apathy re- 
sembles those liquors which never ferment, and are consequently always muddy." 
— Goldsmith. Memoir of Voltaire. 

" He [Johnson] said ' Goldsmith was a plant that flowered late.' There ap- 
peared nothing remarkable about him when he was young." — Boswell. 



256 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

uncle Contarine believed those letters — if Oliver's mother 
believed that story which the youth related of his going to 
Cork with the purpose of embarking for America, of his 
having paid his passage-money, and having sent his kit on 
board ; of the anonymous captain sailing away with Oliver's 
valuable luggage, in a nameless ship, never to return ; if 
uncle Contarine and the mother at Ballymahon believed 
his stories, they must have been a very simple pair ; as it 
was a very simple rogue indeed who cheated them. When 
the lad, after failing in his clerical examination, after fail- 
ing in his plan for studying the law, took leave of these 
projects and of his parents, and set out for Edinburgh, he 
saw mother, and uncle, and lazy Ballymahon, and green 
native turf, and sparkling river for the last time. He was 
never to look on old Ireland more, and only in fancy revisit 
her. 

" But me not destined such delights to share, 
My prime of life in wandering spent and care, 
Impelled, with step unceasing, to pursue 
Some fleeting good that mocks me with the view ; 
That like the circle bounding earth and skies 
Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies : 
My fortune leads to traverse realms unknown, 
And find no spot of all the world my own." 

I spoke in a former lecture of that high courage which 
enabled Fielding, in spite of disease, remorse, and poverty, 
always to retain a cheerful spirit and to keep his manly 
benevolence and love of truth intact, as if these treasures 
had been confided to him for the public benefit, and he was 
accountable to posterity for their honourable employ ; and 
a constancy equally happy and admirable I think was 
shown by Goldsmith, whose sweet and friendly nature 
bloomed kindly always in the midst of a life's storm, and 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 257 

rain, and bitter weather.' The poor fellow was never so 
friendless hut he could befriend some one ; never so pinched 
and wretched but he could give of his crust, and speak his 
word of compassion. If he had but his flute left, he could 
give that, and make the children happy in the dreary Lon- 
don court. He could give the coals in that queer coal- 
scuttle we read of to his poor neighbour : he could give 
away his blankets in college to the poor widow, and warm 
himself as he best might in the feathers : he could pawn 
his coat to save his landlord from gaol : when he was a 
school-usher, he spent his earnings in treats for the boys, 
and the good-natured schoolmaster's wife said justly that 
she ought to keep Mr. Goldsmith's money as well as the 
young gentlemen's. When he met his pupils in later life, 
nothing would satisfy the Doctor but he must treat them 
still. "Have you seen the print of me after Sir Joshua 
Reynolds ?" he asked of one of his old pupils. " Not seen 
it ? not bought it ? Sure, Jack, if your picture had been 
published, I'd not have been without it half an hour." 
His purse and his heart were everybody's, and his friends' 
as much as his own. When he was at the height of his 
reputation, and the Earl of Northumberland, going as Lord 
Lieutenant to Ireland, asked if he could be of any service 
to Dr. Goldsmith ? Goldsmith recommended his brother, 
and not himself, to the great man. " My patrons," he gal- 



* " An ' inspired idiot,' Goldsmith, hangs strangely about him [Johnson] 

Yet, on the whole, there is no evil in the ' gooseberry-fool,' but rather much good ; 
of a finer, if of a weaker sort than Johnson's ; and all the more genuine that he him- 
self could never become conscious of it, — though unhappily never cease attemptmg 
to become so : the author of the genuine 'Vicar of Wakefield,' nill he will he, must 
needs fly towards such a mass of genuine manhood," — Carlyle's Essays (2nd 
ed.), vol. iv. p. 91. 



258 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

lantly said, " are the booksellers, and I want no others.'" 
Hard patrons they were, and hard work he did ; hut he did 
not complain much : if in his early writings some hitter 
words escaped him, some allusions to neglect and poverty, 
he withdrew these expressions when his works were repub- 
lished, and better days seemed to open for him ; and he 
did not care to complain that printer or publisher had over- 
looked his merit, or left him poor. The Court face was 
turned from honest Oliver, the Court patronised Beattie ; 
the fashion did not shine on him — fashion adored Sterne.' 
Fashion pronounced Kelly to be the great writer of comedy 

^ " At present, the few poets of England no longer depend on the great for sub- 
sistence ; they have now no other patrons but the public, and the public, collective- 
ly considered, is a good and a generous master. It is indeed too frequently mis- 
taken as to the merits of every candidate for favour ; but to make amends it is 
never mistaken long. A performance indeed may be forced for a time into reputa- 
tion, but, destitute of real merit, it soon sinks ; time, the touchstone of what is truly 
valuable, will soon discover the fraud, and an author should never arrogate to him- 
self any share of success till his works have been read at least ten years with sat- 
isfaction. 

" A man of letters at present, whose works are valuable, is perfectly sensible of 
their value. Every polite member of the community, by buying what he writes, con- 
tributes to reward him. The ridicule, therefore, of living in a garret might have 
been wit in the last age, but continues such no longer, because no longer true. A 
■writer of real merit now may easily be rich, if his heart be set only on fortune : 
and for those who have no merit, it is but fit that such should remain in merited 
obscurity." — Goldsmith. Citizen of the World, Let. 84. 

' Goldsmith attacked Sterne, obviously enough censuring his indecency, and 
slighting his wit, and ridiculing his manner, in the 53rd letter in the " Citizen of 
the World." 

" As in common conversation," says he, " the best way to make the audience 
laugh is by first laughing yourself; so, in writing, the properest manner is to show 
an attempt at humour, which will pass upon most for h>imour in reality. To effect 
this, readers must be treated with the most perfect familiarity ; in one page the 
author is to make them a low bow, and in the next to pull them by the nose ; he 
must talk in riddles, and then send them to bed in order to dream for the solution," 
&c. 

Sterne's humorous mot on the subject of the gravest part of the charges, then, as 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 259 

of his day. A little — not ill-humour, but plaintiveness — 
a little betrayal of wounded pride which he showed render 
him not the less amiable. The author of the "Vicar of 
Wakefield" had a right to protest when Newbery kept back 
the MS. for two years : had a right to be a little peevish 
with Sterne ; a little angry when Coleman's actors declined 
their parts in his delightful comedy, when the manager 
refused to have a scene painted for it, and pronounced its 
damnation before hearing. He had not the great public 
with him ; but he had the noble Johnson, and the admira- 
ble Reynolds, and the great Gribbon, and the great Burke, 
and the great Fox — friends and admirers illustrious indeed, 
as famous as those who, fifty years before, sate round Pope's 
table. 

Nobody knows, and I dare say Goldsmith's buoyant tem- 
per kept no account of all the pains which he endured during 
the early period of his literary career. Should any man of 
letters in our day have to bear up against such. Heaven 
grant he may come out of the period of misfortune with 
such a pure kind heart as that which Goldsmith obsti- 
nately bore in his breast. The insults to which he had to 
submit are shocking to read of, — slander, contumely, vul- 
gar satire, brutal malignity perverting his commonest mo- 
tives and actions : he had his share of these, and one's an- 



now, made against him, may perhaps be quoted here, from the excellent, the re- 
spectable Sir Walter Scott. 

" Soon after ' Tristram' had appeared, Sterne asked a Yorkshire lady of fortune 
and condition, whether she had read his book. 'I have not, Mr. Sterne,' was the 
answer ; ' and to be plain with you, I am informed it is not proper for female pe- 
rusal.' ' My dear good lady,' replied the author, ' do not be gulled by such stories ; 
the book is like your young heir there (pointing to a child of three years old, who 
was rolling on the carpet in his white tunics), he shows at times a good deal that 
is usually concealed, but it is all in perfect innocence.' " 



260 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

ger is roused at reading of them, as it is at seeing a woman 
insulted or a child assaulted, at the notion that a creature 
so very gentle and weak, and full of love, should have had 
to suffer so. And he had worse than insult to undergo — to 
own to fault, and deprecate the anger of ruffians. There 
is a letter of his extant to one Grriffiths, a bookseller, in 
which poor Goldsmith is forced to confess that certain books 
sent by Griffiths are in the hands of a friend from whom 
Goldsmith had been forced to borrow money. " He was 
wild, sir," Johnson said, speaking of Goldsmith to Boswell, 
with his great, wise benevolence and noble mercifulness of 
heart, " Dr. Goldsmith was wild, sir ; but he is so no more." 
Ah ! if we pity the good and weak man who suffers unde- 
servedly, let us deal very gently with him from whom mis- 
ery extorts not only tears, but shame ; let us think humbly 
and charitably of the human nature that suffers so sadly 
and falls so low. Whose turn may it be to-morrow ? What 
weak heart, confident before trial, may not succumb under 
temptation invincible ? Cover the good man who has been 
vanquished — cover his face and pass on. 

For the last half dozen years of his life, Goldsmith was 
far removed from the pressure of any ignoble necessity : 
and in the receipt, indeed, of a pretty large income from 
the booksellers, his patrons. Had he lived but a few years 
more, his public fame would have been as great as his pri- 
vate reputation, and he might have enjoyed alive a part of 
that esteem which his country has ever since paid to the 
vivid and versatile genius who has touched on almost every 
subject of literature, and touched nothing that he did not 
adorn. Except in rare instances a man is known in our 
{)rofession, and esteemed as a skilful workman, years before 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 261 

the lucky hit, which trebles his usual gains, and stamps 
him a popular author. In the strength of his age, and the 
dawn of his reputation, having for backers and friends the 
most illustrious literary men of his time,' fame and pros- 
perity might have been in store for Goldsmith, had fate so 
willed ; and at forty-six, had not sudden disease carried 
him off. I say prosperity rather than competence, for it is 
probable that no sum could have put order into his affairs 
or sufficed for his irreclaimable habits of dissipation. It 
must be remembered that he owed 2000/. when he died. 
" Was ever poet," Johnson asked, " so trusted before ?" 
As has been the case with many another good fellow of 
his nation, his life was tracked and his substance wasted 
by crowds of hungry beggars and lazy dependants. If they 
came at a lucky time (and be sure they knew his affairs 
better than he did himself, and watched his pay day), he 
gave them of his money : if they begged on empty-purse 
days he gave them his promissory bills : or he treated them 
to a tavern where he had credit : or he obliged them with 
an order upon honest Mr. Filby for coats, for which he paid 
as long as he could earn, and until the shears of Filby were 
to cut for him no more. Staggering under a load of debt 
and labour, tracked by bailiffs and reproachful creditors. 



* " Goldsmith told us that he was now busy in writing a Natural History ; and 
that he might have full leisure for it, he had taken lodgings at a farmer's house, 
near to the six-inile stone in the Edge ware Road, and had carried down his books 
in two returned post-chaises He said he believed tlie farmer's family thought him 
an odd character, similar to that in which the Spectator appeared to his landlady 
and her children ; he was The Gentleman. Mr. Mickle, the translator of the ' Lu- 
siad,' and I, went to visit him at this place a few days afterwards. He was not at 
home ; but having a curiosity to see his apartment, we went in, and found curious 
scraps of description of animals scrawled upon the wall with a blacklead pencil." — 

BOSWELL. 



262 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

running from a hundred poor dependants, whose appealing 
looks were perhaps the hardest of all pains for him to bear, 
devising fevered plans for the morrow, new histories, new 
comedies, all sorts of new literary schemes, flying from all 
these into seclusion, and out of seclusion into pleasure — at 
last, at five and forty, death seized him and closed his ca- 
reer.' I have been many a time in the Chambers in the 
Temple which were his, and passed up the stair-case, which 
Johnson, and Burke, and Reynolds trod to see their friend, 
their poet, their kind G-oldsmith — the stair on which the 
poor women sate weeping bitterly when they heard that 
greatest and most generous of all men was dead within the 
black oak door.'' Ah, it was a different lot from that for 
which the poor fellow sighed, when he wrote with heart 
yearning for home those most charming of all fond verses, 
in which he fancies he revisits Auburn — 



1 " When Goldsmith was dying, Dr. Turton said to him, ' Your pulse is in greater 
disorder than it should be from the degree of fever which you have ; is your mind 
at ease?' Goldsmith ansvpered it was not." — Dr. Johnson (m Boswell). 

" Chambers, you find, is gone far, and poor Goldsmith is gone much further. He 
died of a fever, exasperated, as I believe, by the fear of distress. He had raised 
money and squandered it, by every artifice of acquisition and folly of expense. But 
let not his failings be remembered; he was a very great man." — Dr. Johnson to 
Boswell, July 5th, 1774. 

» " When Burke was told [of Goldsmith's death] he burst into tears. Reynolds 
was in his painting-room when the messenger went to him ; but at once he laid his 
pencil aside, which in times of great family distress he had not been known to do ; 
left his painting-room, and did not re-enter it that day 

" The stair-case of Brick Court is said to have been filled with mourners, the re- 
verse of domestic ; women without a home, without domesticity of any kind, with 
no friend but him they had come to weep for ; outcasts of that great, solitary, wicked 
city, to whom he had never forgotten to be kind and charitable. And he had do- 
mestic mourners, too. His coffin wae re-opened at the request of Miss Horneck 
and her sister (such was the regard he was known to have for them !) that a lock 
might be cut from liis hair. It was in Mrs. Gwyn's possession when she died, after 
nearly seventy years." — Forster's Goldsmith. 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 263 



■' Here as I take my solitary rounds, 
Amidst thy tangled walks and ruined grounds, 
And, many a year elapsed, return to view 
Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, 
Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train. 
Swells at my heart, and turns the past to pain. 

In all my wanderings round this world of care. 
In all my griefs — and God has given my share, 
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown. 
Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down ; 
To husband out life's taper at the close, 
And keep the flame from wasting by repose ; 
I still had hopes — for pride attends us still — 
Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill. 
Around my fire an evening group to draw. 
And tell of all I felt and all I saw ; 
And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue, 
Pants to the place from whence at first she flew — 
I still had hopes — my long vexations past, 
Here to return, and die at home at last. 

O blest retirement, friend to life's decline ! 
Retreats from care that never must be mine — 
How blest is he who crowns in shades like these, 
A youth of labour with an age of ease ; 
Who quits a world where strong temptations try. 
And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly ! 
For him no wretches born to work and weep 
Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep ; 
No surly porter stands in guilty state 
To spurn imploring famine from his gate : 
But on he moves to meet his latter end. 
Angels around befriending virtue's friend ; 
Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay, 
Whilst resignation gently slopes the way ; 
And all his prospects brightening at the last. 
His heaven commences ere the world be past." 

In these verses, I need not say with what melody, with 
what touching truth, with what exquisite beauty of com- 
parison — as indeed in hundreds more pages of the writings 
of this honest soul — the whole character of the man is told 



264 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

— his humble confession of faults and weakness ; his pleas- 
ant little vanity, and desire that his village should admire 
him ; his simple scheme of good in which everybody was 
to be happy — no beggar was to be refused his dinner — no- 
body in fact was to work much, and he to be the harmless 
chief of the Utopia, and the monarch of the Irish Yvetot. 
He would have told again, and without fear of their fail- 
ing, those famous jokes^ which had hung fire in London ; 



' " Goldsmith's incessant desire of being conspicuous in company was the occa- 
sion of his sometimes appearing to such disadvantage, as one should hardly have 
supposed possible in a man of his genius. When his literary reputation had risen 
deservedly high, and his society was much courted, he became very jealous of the 
extraordinary attention which was everywhere paid to Johnson. One evening, in 
a circle of wits, he found fault with me for talking of Johnson as entitled to the 
honour of unquestionable superiority. ' Sir,' said he, ' you are for making a mon- 
archy of what should be a republic' 

" He was still more mortified, when, talking in a company with fluent vivacity, 
and, as he flattered himself, to the admiration of all present, a German who sat next 
him, and perceived Johnson rolling himself as if about to speak, suddenly stopped 
him, saying, ' Slay, stay — Toctor Shonson is going to zay zomething.' This was 
no doubt very provoking, especially to one so irritable as Goldsmith, who frequent- 
ly mentioned it with strong expressions of indignation. 

" It may also be observed that Goldsmith was sometimes content to be treated 
with an easy familiarity, but upon occasions would be consequential and important. 
An instance of this occurred in a small particular. Johnson had a way of contract- 
ing the names of his friends, as Beauclerk, Beau. ; Boswell, Bozzy. ... I remem- 
ber one day, when Tom Davies was telling that Dr. Johnson said — ' We are all in 
labour for a name to Goldy's play,' Goldsmith seemed displeased that such a liber- 
ty should be taken with his name, and said, ' I have often desired him not to call 
me Goldy.' " 

This is one of several of Boswell's depreciatory mentions of Goldsmith — which 
may well irritate biographers and admirers — and also those who take that more 
kindly and more profound view of Boswell's own character, which was opened up 
by Mr. Carlylc's famous article on his book. No wonder that Mr. Irving calls Bos- 
well an "incarnation of toadyism." And the worst of it is, that Johnson himself 
has suffered from this habit of the Laird of Auchenleck's. People are apt to forget 
under what Boswellian stimulus the great Doctor uttered many hasty things : — 
things no more indicative of the nature of the depths of his character than the phos- 
phoric gleaming of the sea, when struck at night, is indicative of radical corruption 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 265 

he would have talked of his great friends of the Club — of 
my Lord Clare and my Lord Bishop, my Lord Nugent — 
sure he knew them intimately, and was hand and glove 
with some of the best men in town — and he would have 
spoken of Johnson and of Burke, from Cork, and of Sir 
Joshua who had painted him — and he would have told 
wonderful sly stories of Ranelagh and the Pantheon, and 
the masquerades at Madame Cornely's : and he would have 
toasted, with a sigh, the Jessamy Bride — the lovely Mary 
Horneck, 

The figure of that charming young lady forms one of the 
prettiest recollections of Groldsmith's life. She and her 
beautiful sister, who married Bunbury, the graceful and 
humourous amateur artist of those days, when Grilray had 
but just begun to try his powers, were among the kindest 
and dearest of Goldsmith's many friends ; cheered and 
pitied him, travelled abroad with him, made him welcome 
at their home, and gave him many a pleasant holiday. 
He bought his finest clothes to figure at their country-house 
at Barton — he wrote them droll verses. They loved him, 
laughed at him, played him tricks, and made him happy. 

of nature ! In truth, it is clear enough on the whole that both Johnson and Gold- 
smith appreciated each other, and that they mutually knew it. They were — as it 
were, tripped up and flung against each other, occasionally, by the blundering and 
silly gambolling of people in company. 

Something must be allowed for Boswell's " rivalry for Johnson's good graces" 
with Oliver (as Sir Walter Scott has remarked), for Oliver was intimate with the 
Doctor before his biographer was, — and as we all remember, marched off with him 
to " take tea with Mrs. Williams" before Boswell had advanced to that honourable 
degree of intimacy. But, in truth, Boswell — though he perhaps showed more tal- 
ent in his delineation of the Doctor than is generally ascribed to him — had not fac- 
ulty to take a fair view of two great men at a time. Besides, as Mr. Forster justly 
remarks, "he was impatient of Goldsmith from the first hour of their acquaintance," 
—Life and Adventurex, p. 292 

M 



268 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 



He asked for a loan from G-arrick, and Garrick kindly sup- 
plied him, to enable him to go to Barton — hut there were 
no more holidays, and only one brief struggle more for 
poor G-oldsmith — a lock of his hair was taken from the 
coffin and given to the Jessamy Bride. She lived quite 
into our time. Hazlitt saw her an old lady, but beautiful 
still, in Northcote's painting room, who told the eager 
critic how proud she always was that Goldsmith had ad- 
mired her. The younger Colman has left a touching rem- 
iniscence of him. Vol, i. 63, 64. 

" I was only five years old," he says, "when Groldsmith 
took me on his knee one evening whilst he was drinking 
coffee with my father, and began to play with me, which 
amiable act I returned, with the higratitude of a peevish 
brat, by giving him a very smart slap on the face : it must 
have been a tingler, for it left the marks of my spiteful paw 
on his cheek. This infantile outrage was followed by sum- 
mary justice, and I was locked up by my indignant father 
in an adjoining room to undergo solitary imprisonment in 
the dark. Here I began to howl and ioream most abomin- 
ably, which was no bad step towards ray liberation, since 
those who were not inclined to pity me might be likely to 
set me free for the purpose of abating a nuia^nce. 

"At length a generous friend appeared to extricate me 
from jeopardy, and that generous friend was no other than 
the man I had so wantonly molested by assault and battery 
— it was the tender-hearted Doctor himself, with a light- 
ed candle in his hand, and a smile upon his counto'iance, 
which was still partially red from the effects of mj petu- 
lance. I skulked and sobbed as he fondled and soothed, 
till I began to brighten. Groldsmith seized the propiti'^us 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 267 

moment of returning good-humour, when he put down the 
candle and began to conjure. He placed three hats, which 
happened to be in the room, and a shilling under each. 
The shillings he told me were England, France, and Spain. 
' Hey presto cockalorum !' cried the Doctor, and lo, on un- 
covering the shillings, which had been dispersed each be- 
neath a separate hat, they were all found congregated un- 
der one. I was no politician at five years old, and there- 
fore might not have wondered at the sudden revolution 
which brought England, France, and Spain all under one 
crown ; but, as also I was no conjuror, it amazed me be- 
yond measure From that time, whenever the Doctor 

came to visit my father, ' I plucked his gown to share the 
good man's smile ;' a game at romps constantly ensued, and 
we were always cordial friends and merry play-fellows. 
Our unequal companionship varied somewhat as to sports 
as I grew older; but it did not last long: my senior play- 
mate died in his forty-fifth year, when I had attained my 
eleventh In all the numerous accounts of his vir- 
tues and foibles, his genius and absurdities, his knowledge 
of nature and ignorance of the world, his ' compassion for 
another's woe' was always predominant; and my trivial 
story of his humouring a froward child weighs but as a 
feather in the recorded scale of his benevolence." 

Think of him reckless, thriftless, vain if you like — ^but 
merciful, gentle, generous, full of love and pity. He passes 
out of our life, and goes to render his account beyond it. 
Think of the poor pensioners weeping at his grave ; think 
of the noble spirits that admired and deplored him ; think 
of the righteous pen that wrote his epitaph — and of the 
wonderful and unanimous response of affection with which 



268 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

the world has paid hack the love he gave it. His humour 
delighting us still; his song fresh and beautiful as when 
first he charmed with it : his words in all our mouths : his 
very weaknesses beloved and familiar — his benevolent spir- 
it seems still to smile upon us : to do gentle kindnesses : to 
succour with sweet charity: to soothe, caress, and forgive: 
to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy and the poor. 
His name is the last in the list of those men of humour 
who have formed the themes of the discourses which you 
have heard so kindly. Long before I had ever hoped for 
such an audience, or dreamed of the possibility of the good 
fortune which has brought me so many friends, I was at is- 
sue with some of my literary brethren upon a point — which 
they held from tradition I think rather than experience — 
that our profession was neglected in this country; and that 
men of letters were ill-received and held in slight esteem. 
It would hardly be grateful of me now to alter my old opin- 
ion that we do meet with good-will and kindness, with 
generous helping hands in the time of our necessity, with 
cordial and friendly recognition. What claim had any one 
of these of whom I have been speaking, but genius ? What 
return of gratitude, fame, affection, did it not bring to all? 
What punishment befel those who were unfortunate among 
them, but that which follows reckless habits and careless 
lives ? For these faults a wit must suffer like the dullest 
prodigal that ever ran in debt. He must pay the tailor if 
he wears the coat ; his children must go in rags if he spends 
his money at the tavern ; he cannot come to London and be 
made Lord Chancellor if he stops on the road and gambles 
away his last shilling at Dublin. And he must pay the 
social penalty of these follies too, and expect that the world 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 269 

will shun the man of bad habits, that women will avoid the 
man of loose life, that prudent folks will close their doors as 
a precaution, and before a demand should be made on their 
pockets by the needy prodigal. With what difficulty had 
any one of these men to contend, save that eternal and me- 
chanical one of want of means and lack of capital, and of 
which thousands of young lawyers, young doctors, young 
soldiers and sailors, of inventors, manufacturers, shopkeep- 
ers, have to complain? Hearts as brave and resolute as 
ever beat in the breast of any wit or poet, sicken and break 
daily in the vain endeavour and unavailing struggle against 
life's difficulty. Do not we see daily ruined inventors, grey- 
haired midshipmen, balked heroes, blighted curates, barris- 
ters pining a hungry life out in chambers, the attorneys 
never mounting to their garrets, whilst scores of them are 
rapping at the door of the successful quack below ? If 
these suffer, who is the author, that he should be exempt? 
Let us bear our ills with the same constancy with which 
others endure them, accept our manly part in life, hold our 
own, and ask no more, I can conceive of no kings or laws 
causing or curing Goldsmith's improvidence, or Fielding's 
fatal love of pleasure, or Dick Steele's mania for running 
races with the constable. You never can outrun that sure- 
footed ofBcer — not by any swiftness or by dodges devised 
by any genius, however great ; and he carries off the Tatler 
to the spunging-house, or taps the Citizen of the World on 
the shoulder as he would any other mortal. 

Does society look down on a man because he is an au- 
thor ? I suppose if people want a buffoon they tolerate him 
only in so far as he is amusing ; it can hardly be expected 
that they should respect him as an equal. Is there to be 



270 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

a guard of honour provided for the author of the last new 
novel or poem ? how long is he to reign, and keep other 
potentates out of possession? He retires, grumbles, and 
prints a lamentation that literature is despised. If Cap- 
tain A. is left out of Lady B.'s parties he does not state 
that the army is despised: if Lord C. no longer asks Coun- 
sellor D. to dinner, Counsellor D. does not announce that 
the bar is insulted. He is not fair to society if he enters 
it with this suspicion hankering about him ; if he is doubt- 
ful about his reception, how hold up his head honestly, and 
look frankly in the face that world about which he is full 
of suspicion ? Is he place-hunting, and thinking in his 
mind that he ought to be made an Ambassador, like Prior, 
or a Secretary of State, like Addison ? his pretence of equal- 
ity falls to the ground at once : he is scheming for a patron, 
not shaking the hand of a friend, when he meets the world. 
Treat such a man as he deserves ; laugh at his buffoonery, 
and give him a dinner and a bonjour ; laugh at his self- 
sufficiency and absurd assumptions of superiority, and his 
equally ludicrous airs of martyrdom : laugh at his flattery 
and his scheming, and buy it, if it is worth the having. 
Let the wag have his dinner and the hireling his pay, if 
you want him, and make a profound bow to the grand 
hom^ne incompris, and the boisterous martyr, and show 
him the door. The great world, the great aggregate expe- 
rience, has its good sense, as it has its good-humour. It 
detects a pretender, as it trusts a loyal heart. It is kind 
in the main : how should it be otherwise than kind, when 
it is so wise and clear-headed ? To any literary man who 
says, " It despises my profession," I say, with all my might 
— no, no, no. It may pass over your individual case — how 



STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 271 

many a brave fellow has failed in the race, and perished 
unknown in the struggle ! — hut it treats you as you merit 
in the main. If you serve it, it is not unthankful ; if you 
please, it is pleased ; if you cringe to it, it detects you, and 
scorns you if you are mean : it returns your cheerfulness 
with its good-humour ; it deals not ungenerously with your 
weaknesses ; it recognises most kindly your merits ; it 
gives you a fair place and fair play. To any one of those 
men of whom we have spoken was it in the main ungrate- 
ful ? A king might refuse Groldsmith a pension, as a pub- 
lisher might keep his master-piece and the delight of all 
the world in his desk for two years ; but it was mistake, 
and not ill-will. Noble and illustrious names of Swift, and 
Pope, and Addison ! dear and honoured memories of Grold- 
smith and Fielding ! kind friends, teachers, benefactors ! 
who shall say that our country, which continues to bring 
you such an unceasing tribute of applause, admiration, 
love, sympathy, does not do honour to the literary calling 
in the honour which it bestows upon you I 



41 

LECTURE THE SEVENTH. 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 

Several charitable ladies of this city, to some of whom 
I am under great personal obligation, having thought that 
a Lecture of mine would advance a benevolent end which 
they had in view, I have preferred, in place of delivering 
a Discourse, which many of my hearers no doubt know al- 
ready, upon a subject merely literary or biographical, to put 
together a few thoughts which may serve as a supplement 
to the former Lectures, if you like, and which have this at 
least in common with the kind purpose which assembles 
you here, that they rise out of the same occasion, and treat 
of charity. 

Besides contributing to our stock of happiness, to our 
harmless laughter and amusement, to our scorn for false- 
hood and pretension, to our righteous hatred of hypocrisy, 
to our education in the perception of truth, our love of hon- 
esty, our knowledge of life, and shrewd guidance through 
the world, have not our humorous writers, our gay and 
kind week-day preachers, done much in support of that 
holy cause which has assembled you in this place ; and 
which you are all abetting, the cause of love and charity, 
the cause of the poor, the weak, and the unhappy ; the 
sweet mission of love and tenderness, and peace and good- 
will towards men ? That same theme which is urged upon 
you by the eloquence and example of good men to whom 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 273 

you are delighted listeners on Sabbath-days, is taught in 
his way and according to his power by the humorous writ- 
er, the commentator on every-day life and manners. 

And as you are here assembled for a charitable purpose, 
giving your contributions at the^oor to benefit deserving 
people who need them without, I like to hope and think 
that the men of our calling have done something in aid of 
the cause of charity, and have helped, with kind words and 
kind thoughts at least, to confer happiness and to do good. 
If the humorous writers claim to be week-day preachers, 
have they conferred any benefit by their sermons? Are 
people happier, better, better disposed to their neighbours, 
more inclined to do works of kindness, to love, forbear, for- 
give, pity, after reading in Addison, in Steele, in Fielding, 
in Goldsmith, in Hood, in Dickens? I hope and believe so, 
and fancy that in writing they are also acting charitably, 
contributing with the means which Heaven supplies them, 
to forward the end which brings you too together. 

A love of the human species is a very vague and indefi- 
nite kind of virtue, sitting very easily on a man, not con- 
fining his actions at all, shining in print, or exploding in 
paragraphs, after which efforts of benevolence, the philan- 
thropist is sometimes said to go home, and be no better 
than his neighbours. TartufFe and Joseph Surface, Stig- 
gins and Chadband, who are always preaching fine senti- 
ments, and are no more virtuous than hundreds of those 
whom they denounce and whom they cheat, are fair objects 
of mistrust and satire ; but their hypocrisy, the homage, 
according to the old saying, which vice pays to virtue, has 
this of good in it, that its fruits are good : a man may preach 
good morals, though he may be himself but a lax practi- 

M2 



274 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

tioner ; a Pharisee may put pieces of gold into the charity- 
plate out of mere hypocrisy and ostentation, but the bad 
man's gold feeds the widow and the fatherless as well as 
the good man's. The butcher and baker must needs look, 
not to motives, but to money, in return for their wares. 

I am not going to hint that we of the Literary calling 
resemble Monsieur Tartufte or Monsieur Stiggins, though 
there may be such men in our body, as there are in all. 

A literary man of the humoristic turn is pretty sure to 
be of a philanthropic nature, to have a great sensibility, to 
be easily moved to pain or pleasure, keenly to appreciate 
the varieties of temper of people round about him, and sym- 
pathise in their laughter, love, amusement, tears. Such a 
man is philanthropic, man-loving by nature, as another is 
irascible, or red-haired, or six feet high. And so I would 
arrogate no particular merit to literary men for the posses- 
sion of this faculty of doing good which some of them en- 
joy. It costs a gentleman no sacrifice to be benevolent on 
paper ; and the luxury of indulging in the most beautiful 
and brilliant sentiments never makes any man a penny the 
poorer. A literary man is no better than another, as far 
as my experience goes ; and a man writing a book, no bet- 
ter nor no worse than one who keeps accounts in a ledger, 
or follows any other occupation. Let us, however, give him 
credit for the good, at least, which he is the means of do- 
ing, as we give credit to a man with a million for the hund- 
red which he puts into the plate at a charity-sermon. He 
never misses them. He has made them in a moment by a 
lucky speculation, and parts with them, knowing that he 
has an almost endless balance at his bank, whence he can call 
for more. But in esteeming the benefaction, we are grate- 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 276 

ful to the benefactor, too, somewhat; and so of men of 
genius, richly endowed, and lavish in parting with their 
mind's wealth, we may view them at least kindly and fa- 
vorably, and be thankful for the bounty of which Prov- 
idence has made them the dispensers. 

I have said myself somewhere, I do not know with what 
correctness (for definitions never are complete), that humour 
is wit and love ; I am sure, at any rate, that the best humour 
is that which contains most humanity, that which is fla- 
voured throughout with tenderness and kindness. This love 
does not demand constant utterance or actual expression, 
as a good father, in conversation with his children or wife, is 
not perpetually embracing them, or making protestations 
of his love ; as a lover in the society of his mistress is not, 
at least as far as I am led to believe, for ever squeezing her 
hand, or sighing in her ear, "My soul's darling, I adore 
you !" He shows his love by his conduct, by his fidelity, 
by his watchful desire to make the beloved person happy ; it 
lightens from his eyes when she appears, though he may not 
speak it; it fills his heart when she is present or absent; 
influences all his words and actions ; suffuses his whole be- 
ing; it sets the father cheerily to work through the long 
day, supports him through the tedious labour of the weary 
absence or journey, and sends him happy home again, 
yearning towards the wife and children. This kind of love 
is not a spasm, but a life. It fondles and caresses at due 
seasons, no doubt; but the fond heart is always beating 
fondly and truly, though the wife is not sitting hand-in- 
hand with him, or the children hugging at his knee. And 
so with a loving humour : I think, it is a genial writer's hab- 
it of being; it is the kind, gentle spirit's way of looking out 



276 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

/ on the world — that sweet friendliness, which fills his heart 
and his style. You recognise it, even though there may 
not be a single point of wit, or a single pathetic touch in the 

/ page ; though you may not be called upon to salute his ge- 
nius by a laugh or a tear. That collision of ideas, which 
provokes the one or the other, must be occasional. They 
must be like papa's embraces, which I spoke of anon, who 
only delivers them now and again, and cannot be expected 
to go on kissing the children all night. And so the writer's 
jokes and sentiment, his ebullitions of feeling, his outbreaks 
of high spirits, must not be too frequent. One tires of a 
page of which every sentence sparkles with points, of a sen- 
timentalist who is always pumping the tears from his eyes 
or your own. One suspects the genuineness of the tear, the 
naturalness of the humour; these ought to be true and 
manly in a man, as everything else in his life should be 
manly and true; and he loses his dignity by laughing or 
weeping out of place, or too often. 

When the Reverend Lawrence Sterne begins to senti- 
mentalize over the carriage in Monsieur Dessein's court- 
yard, and pretends to squeeze a tear out of a ricketty old 
shandrydan ; when, presently, he encounters the dead don- 
key on his road to Paris, and snivels over that asinine corpse, 
I say: " Away you drivelling quack : do not palm off these 
grimaces of grief upon simple folks who know no better, and 
cry misled by your hypocrisy." .^Tears are sacred. )The trib- 
utes of kind hearts to misfortune, the mites which gentle 
souls drop into the collections made for God's poor and un- 
happy, are not to be tricked out of them by a whimpering 
hypocrite, handing round a begging-box for your compas- 
sion, and asking your pity for a lie. When that same man 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 277 

tells me of Lefevre's illness and Uncle Toby's charity ; of the 
noble at Rennes coming home and reclaiming his sword, 
1 thank him for the generous emotion which, springing gen- 
uinely from his own heart, has caused mine to admire be- 
nevolence and sympathise with honour ; and to feel love, 
and kindness, and pity. 

If I do not love Swift, as, thank God, I do not, however 
immensely I may admire him, it is because I revolt from 
the man who placards himself as a professional hater of 
his own kind ; because he chisels his savage indignation on 
his"t6mb-stone, as if to perpetuate his protest against being 
born of our race — the suffering, the weak, the erring, the 
wicked, if you will, but still the friendly, the loving chil- 
dren of Grod our Father : it is because, as I read through 
Swift's dark volumes, I never find the aspect of nature 
seems to delight him ; the smiles of children to please him ; 
the sight of wedded love to soothe him. I do not remember 
in any line of his writing a passing allusion to a natural 
scene of beauty. When he speaks about the families of 
his comrades and brother clergymen, it is to assail them 
with gibes and scorn, and to laugh at them brutally for be- 
ing fathers and for being poor. He does mention in the 
Journal to Stella, a sick child, to be sure — a child of Lady 
Masham, that was ill of the small-pox — but then it is to 
confound the brat for being ill, and the mother for attend- 
ing to it, when she should have been busy about a court 
intrigue, in which the Dean was deeply engaged. And he 
alludes to a suitor of Stella's, and a match she might have 
made, and would have made, very likely, with an honoura- 
ble and faithful and attached man. Tisdall, who loved her, 
and of whom Swift speaks, in a letter to this lady, in Ian- 



278 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

guage so foul that you would not bear to hear it. In treat- 
insr of the good the humourists have done, of the love and 
kindness they have taught and left behind them, it is not 
of this one I dare speak. Heaven help the lonely misan- 
thrope ! be kind to that multitude of sins, with so little char- 
ity to cover them ! / ) 

Of Mr. Congreve's' contributions to the English stock of 
benevolence, I do not speak ; for, of any moral legacy to pos- 
terity, I doubt whether that brilliant man ever thought at 
all. - He had some money, as I have told ; every shilling of 
which he left to his friend the Duchess of Marlborough, a 
lady of great fortune and the highest fashion. He gave 
the gold of his brains to persons of fortune and fashion, too. 
There is no more feeling in his comedies, than in as many 
books of Euclid. He no more pretends to teach love for 
the poor, and good-will for the unfortunate, than a danc- 
ing-master does; he teaches pirouettes and flic-flacs; and 
how to bow to a lady, and to walk a minuet. In his private 
life Congreve was immensely liked — more so than any man 
of his age, almost; and to have been so liked, must have been 
kind and good-natured. His good-nature bore him through 
extreme bodily ills and pain, with uncommon cheerfulness 
and courage. Being so gay, so bright, so popular, such a 
grand seigneur, be sure he was kind to those about him, 
generous to his dependants, serviceable to his friends. So- 
ciety does not like a man so long as it liked Congreve, un- 
less he is likeable ; it finds out a quack very soon ; it scorns 
a poltroon or a curmudgeon ; we may be certain that this 
man was brave, good-tempered, and liberal ; so, very likely, 
is Monsieur Pirouette, of whom we spoke ; he cuts his ca- 
pers, he grins, bows, and dances to his fiddle. In private, 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 279 

he may have a hundred virtues ; in public, he teaches danc- 
ing. His business is cotillions, not ethics. 

As much may be said of those charming and lazy Epi- 
cureans, G-ay and Prior, sweet lyric singers, comrades of 
Anacreon, and disciples of love and the bottle. "Is there: 
any moral shut within the bosom of a rose?" sings our 
great Tennyson. Does a nightingale preach from a bough, 
or the lark from his cloud? Not knowingly; yet we may 
be grateful, and love larks and roses, and the flower-crown- 
ed minstrels, too, who laugh and who sing. ^ 

Of Addison's contributions to the charity of the world, I \ 
have spoken before, in trying to depict that noble figure ; and 
say now, as then, that we should thank him as one of the 
greatest benefactors of that vast and immeasurably spread- i 
ing family which speaks our common tongue. Wherever it j 
is spoken, there is no man that does not feel, and understand, 1 
and use the noble English word "gentleman." And there-^ 
is no man that teaches us to be gentlemen better than Jo- I 
seph Addison. Gentle in our bearing through life ; gentle \ 
and courteous to our neighbour ; gentle in dealing with his ' 
follies and weaknesses ; gentle in treating his opposition ; 
deferential to the old ; kindly to the poor, and those below 
us in degree ; for people above us and below us we must 
find, in whatever hemisphere we dwell, whether kings or 
presidents govern us ; and in no republic or monarchy that 
I know of, is a citizen exempt from the tax of befriending 
poverty and weakness, of respecting age, and of honouring 
his father and mother.-' It has just been whispered to me 
— I have not been three months in the country, and, of 
course, cannot venture to express an opinion of my own — 
that, in regard to paying this latter tax of respect and hon- 



280 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

our to age, some very few of the Republican youths are oc- 
casionally a little remiss. I have heard of young Sons of 
Freedom puhlishing their Declaration of Independence be- 
fore they could well spell it ; and cutting the connexion be- 
tween father and mother before they had learned to shave. 

.**- My own time of life having been stated by various enlight- 
ened organs of public opinion, at almost any figure from for- 
ty-five to sixty, I cheerfully own that I belong to the Fogy 
interest, and ask leave to rank in, and plead for, that re- 
spectable class. Now a gentleman can but be a gentleman, 
in Broadway or the backwoods, in Pall-Mali or California; 
and where and whenever he lives, thousands of miles away 
in the wilderness, or hundreds of years hence, I am sure 
that reading the writings of this true gentleman, this true 
Christian, this noble Joseph Addison, must do him good. 

Sy He may take Sir Roger de Coverley to the Diggings with 
him, and learn to be gentle and good-humoured, and ur- 
bane, and friendly in the midst of that struggle in which 
his life is engaged. -I take leave to say that the most brill- 

/"iant youth of this city may read over this delightful me- 

^ raorial of a by-gone age, of fashions long passed away ; of 
manners long since changed and modified ; of noble gentle- 
men, and a great, and a brilliant and polished society ; and 
find in it much to charm and polish, to refine and instruct 
him. A courteousness, which can be out of place at no 
time, and under no flag. A politeness and simplicity, a 
truthful manhood, a gentle respect and deference, which 
may be kept as the unbought grace of life, and cheap de- 
fence of mankind, long after its old artificial distinctions, 
after periwigs, and small-swords, and ruffes, and red-heeled 
shoes, and titles, and stars and garters have passed away. 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 281 

I will tell you when I have been put in mind of two of the 
finest gentlemen books bring us any mention of. I mean 
our books (not books of history, but books of humour). I 
will tell you when I have been put in mind of the courteous 
gallantry of the noble knight, Sir Roger de Coverley of Co- 
verley Manor, of the noble Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Man- 
cha : here in your own omnibus-carriages and railway-cars, 
when I have seen a woman step in, handsome or not, well- 
dressed or not, and a workman in hob-nail shoes, or a dandy 
in the height of the fashion, rise up and give her his place. 
I think Mr. Spectator, with his short face, if he had seen 
such a deed of courtesy, would have smiled a sweet smile 
to the doer of that gentleman-like action, and have made 
him a low bow from under his great periwig, and have gone 
home and written a pretty paper about him. 

I am sure Dick Steele would have hailed him, were he 
dandy or mechanic, and asked him to a tavern to share a 
bottle, or perhaps half a dozen. Mind, I do not set down 
the five last flasks to Dick's score for virtue, and look upon 
them as works of the most questionable supererogation. 

Steele, as a literary benefactor to the world's charity, 
must rank very high, indeed, not merely from his givings, 
which were abundant, but because his endowments are 
prodigiously increased in value since he bequeathed them, 
as the revenues of the lands, bequeathed to our Foundling- 
Hospital at London, by honest Captain Coram, its founder, 
are immensely enhanced by the houses since built upon 
them. Steele was the founder of sentimental writing in 
English, and how the land has been since occupied, and 
what hundreds of us have laid out gardens and built up 
tenements on Steele's ground ! Before his time, readers or 



282 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

hearers were never called upon to cry except at a tragedy; 
and compassion was not expected to express itself other- 
wise than in blank verse, or for personages much lower 
in rank than a dethroned monarch, or a widowed or a jilt- 
ed empress. He stepped oft' the high-heeled cothurnus, and 
came down into common life ; he held out his great hearty 
arms, and embraced us all; he had a bow for all women; 
a kiss for all children ; a shake of the hand for all men, high 
or low; he showed us Heaven's sun shining every day on 
quiet homes ; not gilded palace-roofs only, or court proces- 
sions, or heroic warriors fighting for princesses and pitched 
battles. He took away comedy from behind the fine lady's 
alcove, or the screen where the libertine was watching her. 
He ended all that wretched business of wives jeering at 
their husbands, of rakes laughing wives, and husbands too, 
to scorn. That miserable, rouged, tawdry, sparkling, hol- 
low-hearted comedy of the Restoration fled before him, and, 
like the wicked spirit in the Fairy-books, shrank, as Steele 
let the daylight in, and shrieked, and shuddered, and van- 
ished. The stage of humourists has been common-life ever 
since Steele's and Addison's time; the joys and griefs, the 
aversions and sympathies, the laughter and tears of nature. 
And here, coming oft" the stage, and throwing aside the 
motley -habit, or satiric disguise, in which he had before en- 
tertained you, mingling with the world, and wearing the 
same coat as his neighbour, the humourist's service became 
straightway immensely more available ; his means of doing 
good infinitely multiplied ; his success, and the esteem in 
which he was held, proportionately increased. It requires 
an effort, of which all minds are not capable, to understand 
Don Quixote; children and common people still read Grulli- 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR 283 

ver for the story merely. Many more persons are sickened 
by Jonathan Wyld than can comprehend the satire of it. 
Each of the great men who wrote those books M'as speak- 
ing from behind the satiric mask I anon mentioned. Its 
distortions appal many simple spectators ; its settled sneer 
or laugh is unintelligible to thousands, who have not the 
wit to interpret the meaning of the vizored satirist preach- 
ing from within. Many a man was at fault about Jonathan 
Wyld's greatness, who could feel and relish Allworthy's 
goodness in Tom Jones, and Doctor Harrison's in Amelia, 
and dear Parson Adams, and Joseph Andrews. We love to 
read ; we may grow ever so old, but we love to read of them 
still-^of love and beauty, of frankness, and bravery, and 
generosity. "We hate hypocrites and cowards ; we long to 
defend oppressed innocence, and to soothe and succour gen- 
tle women and children. "We are glad when vice is foiled 
and rascals punished ; we lend a foot to kick Blifil down 
stairs ; and as we attend the brave bridegroom to his wed- 
ding on the happy marriage day, we ask the grooms-man's 
privilege to salute the blushing cheek of Sophia. A lax 
morality in many a vital point I own in Fielding, but a 
great hearty sympathy and benevolence ; a great kindness 
for the poor; a great gentleness and pity for the unfortu- 
nate ; a great love for the pure and good ; these are among 
the contributions to the charity of the world with which 
this erring but noble creature endowed it. 

As for Groldsmith, if the youngest and most unlettered 
person here has not been happy with the family at Wake- 
field; has not rejoiced when Olivia returned, and been 
thankful for her forgiveness and restoration ; has not laugh- 
ed with delighted good humour over Moses's gross of green 



284 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

spectacles ; has not loved with all his heart the good Vicar, 
and that kind spirit which created these charming figures, 
and devised the beneficent fiction which speaks to us so ten- 
derly — what call is there for me to speak? In this place, 
and on this occasion, remembering these men, I claim from 
you your sympathy for the good they have done, and for the 
sweet charity which they have bestowed on the world. 

When humour joins with rhythm and music, and appears 
in song, its influence is irresistible ; its charities are count- 
less, it stirs the feelings to love, peace, friendship, as scarce 
any moral agent can. The songs of Beranger are hymns of 
love and tenderness ; I have seen great whiskered French- 
men warbling the "Bonne Vieille," the "Soldats au pas, 
au pas ;" with tears rolling down their mustaches. At a 
Burns's Festival, I have seen Scotchmen singing Burns, 
while the drops twinkled on their furrowed cheeks : while 
each rough hand was flung out to grasp its neighbour's ; 
while early scenes and sacred recollections, and dear and 
delightful memories of the past came rushing back at tho 
sound of the familiar words and music, and the softened 
heart was full of love, and friendship, and home. Humour ! 
if tears are the alms of gentle spirits, and may be counted, 
as sure they may, among the sweetest of life's charities. 
Of that kindly sensibility, and sweet sudden emotion, which 
( exhibits itself at the eyes, I know no such provocative as 
': humour. It is an irresistible sympathiser ; it surprises you 
! into compassion: you are laughing and disarmed, and sud- 
denly forced into tears. I heard a humorous balladist not 
lonof since, a minstrel with wool on his head, and an ultra- 
Ethiopian complexion, who performed a negro ballad, that 
I confess moistened these spectacles in the most unexpecte(^ 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 285 

manner. They have gazed at dozens of tragedy-queens, 
dying on the stage, and expiring in appropriate blank verse, 
and I never wanted to wipe them. They have looked up, 
with deep respect be it said, at many scores of clergymen 
in pulpits, and without being dimmed ; and behold a vaga- 
bond with a corked face and a banjo sings a little song, 
strikes a wild note which sets the whole heart thrilling 
with happy pity. Humour! humour is the mistress of 
tears ; she knows the way to the fojis lachrymarum, strikes 
in dry and rugged places with her enchanting wand, and 
bids the fountain gush and sparkle. She has refreshed myr- 
iads more from her natural springs, than ever tragedy has 
watered from her pompous old urn. 

Popular humour, and especially modern popular hu- 
mour, and the writers, its exponents, are always kind and 
chivalrous, taking the side of the weak against the strong. 
In our plays, and books, and entertainments for the lower 
classes in England, I scarce remember a story or theatrical 
piece in which a wicked aristocrat is not bepummelled by a 
dashing young champion of the people. There was a book 
which had an immense popularity in England, and I be- 
lieve has been greatly read here, in which the Mysteries of 
the Court of London were said to be unveiled by a gentle- 
man, who I suspect knows about as much about the court 
of London as he does of that of Pekin. Years ago I treated 
myself to sixpennyworth of this performance at a railway 
station, and found poor dear G-eorge the Fourth, our late 
most religious and gracious king, occupied in the most fla- 
gitious designs against the tradesmen's families in his me- 
tropolitan city. A couple of years after, I took sixpenny- 
worth more of the same delectable history: Greorge the 



286 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

Fourth was still at work, still ruining the peace of trades- 
men's families ; he had been at it for two whole years, and 
a bookseller at the Brighton station told me that this book 
was by many, many times the most popular of all period- 
ical tales then published, because, says he, "it lashes the 
aristocracy !" Not long since, I went to two penny-theatres 
in London ; immense eager crowds of people thronged the 
buildings, and the vast masses thrilled and vibrated with 
the emotion produced by the piece represented on the stage, 
and burst into applause or laughter, such as many a polite 
actor would sigh for in vain. In both these pieces there 
was a wiclted Lord kicked out of the window — ^there is al- 
ways a wicked Lord kicked out of the window. First piece : 
— "Domestic drama — Thrilling interest! — Weaver's fam- 
ily in distress! — Fanny gives away her bread to little 
Jacky, and starves! — Enter wicked Lord: tempts Fanny 
with offer of Diamond Necklace, Champagne Suppers, and 
Coach to ride in! — Enter sturdy Blacksmith. — Scuffle be- 
tween Blacksmith and Aristocratic minion : exit wicked 
Lord out of the window." Fanny, of course, becomes Mrs. 
Blacksmith. 

The second piece was a nautical drama, also of thrilling in- 
terest, consisting chiefly of hornpipes, and acts of most tre- 
mendous oppression on the part of certain Earls and Magis- 
trates towards the people. Two wicked Lords were in this 
piece the atrocious scoundrels : one Aristocrat, a deep-dyed 
villain, in short duck trowsers and Berlin eotton gloves; 
while the other minion of wealth enjoyed an eye-glass with 
a blue ribbon, and whisked about the stage with a penny 
cane. Having made away with Fanny Forester's lover, 
Tom Bowling, by means of a press-gang, they meet her all 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 287 

alone on a common, and subject her to the most opprobrious 
language and behaviour: "Release me, villains!" says Fan- 
ny, pulling a brace of pistols out of her pockets, and crossing 
them over her breast so as to cover wicked Lord to the right, 
wicked Lord to the left ; and they might have remained in 
that position ever so much longer (for the aristocratic ras- 
cals had pistols too), had not Tom Bowling returned from 
sea at the very nick of time, armed with a great marline- 
spike, with which — whack ! whack ! down goes wicked 
Lord, No. 1 — wicked Lord, No. 2. Fanny rushes into Tom's 
arms with an hysterical shriek, and I dare say they mar- 
ry, and are very happy ever after. — Popular fun is always 
kind : it is the champion of the humble against the great. 
In all popular parables, it is Little Jack that conquers, and 
the Griant that topples down. I think our popular authors 
are rather hard upon the great folks. Well, well ! their Lord- 
ships have all the money, and can afford to be laughed at. 
In our days, in England, the importance of the humour- 
ous preacher has prodigiously increased; his audiences are 
enormous ; every week or month his happy congregations 
flock to him; they never tire of such sermons. I believe 
my friend Mr. Punch is as popular to-day as he has been 
any day since his birth ; I believe that Mr. Dickens's read- 
ers are even more numerous than they have ever been since 
his unrivalled pen commenced to delight the world with its 
humour. We have among us other literary parties; we 
have Punch, as I have said, preaching from his booth; we 
have a Jerrold party very numerous, and faithful to that 
acute thinker and distinguished wit; and we have also — 
it must be said, and it is still to be hoped — a Vanity- Fair 
party, the author of which work has lately been described 



888 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

by the London Times newspaper as a writer of consider- 
able parts, but a dreary misanthrope, who sees no good any- 
where, who sees the sky above him green, I think, instead 
of blue, and only miserable sinners round about him. So 
we are ; so is every writer and every reader I ever heard of; 
so was every being who ever trod this earth, save One. I 
cannot help telling the truth as I view it, and describing 
what I see. To describe it otherwise than it seems to me 
would be falsehood in that calling in which it has pleased 
Heaven to place me ; treason to that conscience which says 
that men are weak ; that truth must be told ; that fault 
must be owned ; that pardon must be prayed for ; and that 
love reigns supreme over all. 

I look back at the good which of late years the kind En- 
glish Humourists have done ; and if you are pleased to rank 
the present speaker among that class, I own to an honest 
pride at thinking what benefits society has derived from 
men of our calling. That " Song of the Shirt," which 
Punch first published, and the noble, the suffering, the 
melancholy, the tender Hood sang, may surely rank as a 
great act of charity to the world, and call from it its thanks 
and regard for its teacher and benefactor. That astonish- 
ing poem, which you all of you know, of the " Bridge of 
Sighs,'" who can read it without tenderness, without rev- 



^ The Bridge of Sighs. 
' Drowned ! Drowned !" — Hamlet. 
One more Unfortunate, 
Weary of breath, 
Rashly importunate 
Gone to her death. 



Take her up tenderly. 
Lift her with care ; 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 289 

erence to Heaven, charity to man, and thanks to the be- 
neficent genius which sang for us so nobly ? 

Fashion'd so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair ! 
Look at her garments 
^ Clinging like cerements ; 

Whilst the wave constantly 
Drips from her clothing ; 
Take her up instantly, 
Loving, not loathing. 

Touch her not scornfully ; 
Think of her mournfully. 
Gently and humanly ; 
Not of the stains of her, 
All that remains of her 
Now, is pure womanly. 
Make no deep scrutiny 
Into her mutiny 
Rash and undutiful ; 
Past all dishonour. 
Death has left on her 
Only the beautiful 

Still, for all slips of hers, 
One of Eve's family — 
Wipe those poor lips of hers 
Oozing so clammily. 
Loop up her tresses 
Escaped from the comb, 
Her fair auburn tresses ; 
Whilst wonderment guesses 
Where was her home ? 
Who was her Father ? 
Who was her Mother ? 
Had she a sister? 
Had she a brother ? 
Or was there a dearer one 
Still, and a nearer one 
Yet, than all other? 
Alas ! for the rarity 
Of Christian charity 

N 



290 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

I never saw the writer but once ; but shall always be 
glad to think that some words of mine, printed in a peri- 
odical of that day, and in praise of these amazing verses 

Under the sun ! 
Oh ! it was pitiful ! 
Near a whole city full, 
Home she had none. 

Sisterly, brotherly, 
Fatherly, motherly. 
Feelings had changed : 
Love by harsh evidence, 
Thrown from its eminence ; 
Even God's providence 
Seeming estranged. 

Where the lamps quiver 
So far in the river, 
With many a light 
From window and casement, 
From garret to basement. 
She stood with amazement, 
Houseless by night. 
The bleak wind of March 
Made her tremble and shiver. 
But not the dark arch. 
Or the black flowing river 
Mad from life's history. 
Glad to death's mystery, 
Swift to be hurl'd — 
Anywhere, anywhere 
Out of the world ! 
In she plunged boldly. 
No matter how coldly 
The rough river ran, 
Over the brink of it 
Picture it — think of it, 
Dissolute man ! 
Lave in it, drink of it 
Then, if you can ! 

Take her up tenderly, 
Lift her with care ; 



.^^ 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 291 

(which, strange to say, appeared ahuost unnoticed at first 
in the magazine in which Mr. Hood published them) — I 
am proud, I say, to think that some words of appreciation 
of mine reached him on his death-bed, and pleased and 
soothed him in that hour of manful resignation and pain. 

As for the charities of Mr. Dickens, multiplied kindness- 
es which he has conferred upon us all ; upon our children ; 
upon people educated and uneducated ; upon the myriads 
here and at home, who speak our common tongue ; have 
not you, have not I, all of us reason to be thankful to this 
kind friend, who soothed and charmed so many hours, 
brought pleasure and sweet laughter to so many homes ; 

Fashion'd so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair ! 

Ere her limbs frigidly 
Stiffen too rigidly, 
Decently — kindly — 
Smoothe and compose them ; 
And her eyes close them, 
Staring so blindly ! 
Dreadfully staring 
Through muddy impurity, 
As when with the daring 
Last look of despairing 
Fixed on futurity. 

Perishing gloomily, 
Spurred by contumely, 
Cold inhumanity, 
Burning insanity, 
Into her rest. 
Cross her hands humbly 
As if praying dumbly, 
Over her breast ! 

Owning her weakness, 
Her evil behavior, 
And leaving with meekness 
Her sins to her Saviour ' 



293 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

made such multitudes of children happy ; endowed us with 
such a sweet store of gracious thoughts, fair fancies, soft 
sympathies, hearty enjoyments. There are creations of 
Mr. Dickens's which seem to me to rank as personal bene- 
fits ; figures so delightful, that one feels happier and better 
for knowing them, as one does for being brought into the 
society of very good men and women. The atmosphere in 
which these people live is wholesome to breathe in ; you 
feel that to be allowed to speak to them is a personal kind- 
ness ; you come away better for your contact with them ; 
your hands seem cleaner from having the privilege of shak- 
ing theirs. Was there ever a better charity sermon preach- 
ed in the world than Dickens's Christmas Carol ? I believe 
it occasioned immense hospitality throughout England ; 
was the means of lighting up hundreds of kind fires at 
Christmas time ; caused a wonderful outpouring of Christ- 
mas good feeling ; of Christmas punch-brewing ; an awful 
slaughter of Christmas turkeys, and roasting and basting of 
Christmas beef As for this man's love of children, that 
amiable organ at the back of his honest head must be per- 
fectly monstrous. All children ought to love him. I know 
two that do, and read his books ten times for once that they 
peruse the dismal preachments of their father. I know one 
who, when she is happy, reads Nicholas Nickleby ; when 
she is unhappy, reads Nicholas Nickleby ; when she is tired, 
reads Nicholas Nickleby ; when she is in bed, reads Nicho- 
las Nickleby ; when she has nothing to do, reads Nicholas 
Nickleby ; and when she has finished the book, reads Nich- 
olas Nickleby over again. This candid young critic, at ten 
years of age, said, " I like Mr. Dickens's books much bet- 
ter than your books, papa ;" and frequently expressed her 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 293 

desire that the latter author should write a hook like one 
of Mr. Dickens's hooks. "W ho ca n ? Every man must say 
his own thoughts in his own voice, in his own way ;' lucky 



1 The following is from the " Curate's Walk," in Punch, for 1847. 

" It was the third out of the four bell-buttons at the door at which the Curate 
pulled ; and the summons was answered after a brief interval. 

" I must premise that the house before which we stopped was No. 14, Sedan 
Buildings, leading out of Great Guelph-street — Dettingen-street, Culloden-street, 
Minden Square and Upper and Lower Caroline Row form part of the same quarter 
— a very queer and solemn quarter to walk in, I think, and one which always sug- 
gests Fielding's novels to me. I can fancy Captain Booth strutting before the very 
door at which we were standing, in tarnished lace, with his hat cocked over his eye, 
and his hand on his hanger; or Lady Bellaston's chair and bearers coming swinging 
down Great Guelph-street, which we have just quitted to enter Sedan Buildings. 

" Sedan Buildings is a little flagged square, ending abruptly with the huge walls 
of Bluck's Brewery. The houses, by many degrees smaller than the large decayed 
tenements in Great Guelph-street, are still not uncomfortable, although shabby. 
There are brass plates on the doors, two on some of them ; or simple names, as 
'Lunt,' ' Padgemore,' &c., (as if no other statement about Lunt and Padgemore 
were necessary at all) under the bells. There are pictures of mangles before two 
of the houses, and a gilt arm with a hammer sticking out from one. I never saw 
a Goldbeater. What sort of a being is he, that he always sticks out his ensign in 
dark, mouldy, lonely, dreary, but somewhat respectable places ? What powerful 
Mulciberian fellows they must be, those Goldbeaters, whacking and thumping with 
huge mallets at the precious metals all day. I wonder what is Goldbeater's skin ? 
and if they get impregnated with the metal ? and are their great arms under their 
clean shirts on Sundays, all gilt and shining ? It is a quiet, kind, respectable place 
somehow, in spite of its shabbiness. Two pewter pints and a jolly little half-pint 
are hanging on the railings in perfect confidence, basking in what little sun comes 
into the Court. A group of small children are making an ornament of oyster shells 
in one comer. Who has that half-pint ? Is it for one of those small ones, or for some 
delicate female recommended to take beer ? The windows in the Court, upon some 
of which the sun glistens, are not cracked, and pretty clean ; it is only the black and 
dreary look behind which gives them a poverty-stricken appearance. No curtains 
or blinds. A bird-cage and a very few pots of flowers here and there. This — with 
the exception of a milkman talking to a whitey-brown woman, made up of bits of 
flannel and strips of faded chintz and calico seemingly, and holding a long bundle 
which cried — this was all I saw in Sedan Buildings while we were waiting until 
the door should open. 

" At last the door was opened, and by a porteress so small, that I wonder how 
she could ever have reached up to the latch. She bobbed a curtsey and smiled 



294 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

is he who has such a charming gift of nature as this, which 
brings all the children in the world trooping to him, and 
beino: fond of him. 



at the Curate, whose face gleamed with benevolence too, in reply to that saluta- 
tion. 

" ' Mother not at home ?' says Frank Whitestock, patting the child on the head. 

" ' Mother's out charing, sir,' replied the girl ; ' but please to walk up, sir.' And 
she led the way up one or two pairs of stairs to that apartment in the house which 
is called the second-floor front ; in which was the abode of the charwoman. 

" There were two young persons in the room, of the respective ages of eight and 
five, I should think. She of five years of age was hemming a duster, being perched 
on a chair at the table in the middle of the room. The elder, of eight, politely 
wiped a chair with a cloth for the accommodation of the good-natured Curate, and 
came and stood between his knees, immediately alongside of his umbrella, which 
also reposed there, and which she by no means equalled in height. 

"'These children attend my school at Saint Timothy's,' Mr. Whitestock said; 
' and Betsy keeps the house while her mother is from home.' 

" Any thing cleaner or neater than this house it was impossible to conceive. 
"^"There was a big bed, which must have been the resting-place of the whole of this 
little family. There were three or four religious prints on the walls, besides two 
framed and glazed, of Prince Coburg and the Princess Charlotte. There were brass 
candlesticks, and a lamb on the chimney-piece, and a cupboard in the corner, dec- 
orated with near half-a-dozen of plates, yellow bowls, and crockery. And on the 
table there were two or three bits of dry bead, and a jug with water, with which 
these three young people (it being then near three o'clock) were about to make their 
meal called tea. 

" Thcit little Betsy, who looks so small, is nearly ten years old ; and has been 
a mother ever since the age of about five. I mean to say, that her own mother 
having to go out upon her charing operations, Betsy assumes command of the room 
during her parent's absence : has nursed her sisters from babyhood up to the present 
time : keeps order over them, and the house as clean as you see it : and goes out 
occasionally and transacts the family purchases of bread, moist sugar, and mother's 
tea. They dine upon bread, tea and breakfast upon bread when they have it, or go 
to bed without a morsel. Their holiday is Sunday, which they spend at Church 
and Sunday-SQhool. The younger children scarcely ever go out save on that day, 
but sit sometimes in the sun, which comes in pretty pleasantly ; sometimes blue in 
the cold, for they very seldom see a fire except to heal irons by, when mother has a 
job of linen to get up. Father was a journeyman book-binder, who died four years 
ago, and is buried among thousands and thousands of the nameless dead who lie 
crowding the black churchyard of St. Timothy's parish. 

"The Curate evidently took especial pride in Victoria, the youngest of these 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 295 

I remember when that famous Nicholas Nickleby came 
out, seeing a letter from a pedagogue in the north of En- 



three children of the charwoman, and caused Betsy to fetch a book which lay at the 
window, and bade her read. It was a Missionary Register which the Curate opened 
hap-hazard, and this baby began to read out in an exceedingly clear and resolute 
voice about — 

" The island of Raritongo is the least frequented of all the Caribbean Archipelago. 
Wankyfungo is four leagues southeast by east, and the peak of the crater of Shu- 
agnahua is distinctly visible. The Irascible entered Raritongo Bay on the evening 
of Thursday 29th, and the next day the Rev. Mr. Flethers, Mrs. Flethers, and their 
nine children, and Shangpooky, the native converted at Cacabawgo, landed and took 
up their residence at the house of Ratatua, the principal chief, who entertained us 
with a yam, a pig, &c., &c., &c. 

" Raritongo, Wankifungo, Archipelago. I protest this little woman read oif each 
of these long words with an ease which perfectly astonished me. Many a lieuten- 
ant in Her Majesty's Heavies would be puzzled with words of half the length. 
Whitestock, by way of reward for her scholarship, gave her another pat on the head ; 
having received which present with a curtsey, she went and put back the book into 
the window, and clambering back into the chair, resumed the hemming of the blue 
duster. 

"I suppose it was the smallness of these people, as well as their singular, neat 
and tidy behaviour, which interested me so. Here were three creatures not so high 
as the table, with all the labours, duties, and cares of life upon their little shoul- 
ders, working and doing their duty like the biggest of my readers ; regular, labori- 
ous, cheerful — content with small pittances, practising a hundred virtues of thrift 
and order. 

" Elizabeth, at ten years of age, might walk out of this house, and take the com- 
mand of a small establishment. She can wash, get up linen, cook, make purchases, 
and buy bargains. If I were ten years old and three feet in height, I would marry 
her, and we would go and live in a cupboard, and share the little half-pint pot of 
porter for dinner. 'Melia, eight years of age, though inferior in accomplishments to 
her sister, is her equal in size, and can wash, scrub, hem, go errands, put her hand 
to the dinner, and make herself generally useful. In a word, she is fit to be a little 
housemaid, to make every thing but the beds, which she can not as yet reach up to. 
As for Victoria's qualifications, they have been mentioned before. I wonder whether 
the Princess Alice can read off ' Raritongo,' &c., as glibly as this surprising little 
animal. 

" I asked the Curate's permission to make these young ladies a present, and ac- 
cordingly produced the sum of sixpence to be divided amongst the three. ' What 
will you do with it V I said, laying down the coin. 

" They answered all three at once, and in a little chorus, ' We'll give it to mother.' 
f 



296 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS. 

gland, which, dismal as it was, was immensely comical, 
" Mr. Dickens's ill-advised publication," wrote the poor 
schoolmaster, "has passed like a whirlwind over the 
schools of the North." He was a proprietor of a cheap 
school ; Dotheboys-Hall was a cheap school. There were 
many such establishments in the northern counties. Par- 
ents were ashamed, that never were ashamed before, until 
the kind satirist laughed at them ; relatives were frighten- 
ed ; scores of little scholars were taken away ; poor school- 
masters had to shut their shops up ; every pedagogue was 
voted a Squeers, and many suffered, no doubt unjustly ; 
but afterwards school-boys' backs were not so much caned ; 
school-boys' meat was less tough and more plentiful ; and 
school-boys' milk was not so sky-blue. What a kind light 
of benevolence it is that plays round Crummies and the 



This verdict caused the disbursement of another sixpence, and it was explained to 
them that the sum was for their own private pleasures, and each was called upon 
to declare what she would purchase. 

" Elizabeth says, ' I would like two penn'orth of meat, if you please, sir.' 

" 'Melia : ' Ha'porth of treacle, three farthings' worth of milk, and the same of 
fresh bread.' 

" Victoria, speaking very quick, and gasping in an agitated manner. ' Ha'pny — 
aha — orange, and ha'pn)' — aha — apple, and ha'pny — aha — treacle, and, and aha—' 
here her imagination failed her. She did not know what to do with the rest of the 
money. 

" At this 'Melia actually interposed, ' Suppose she and Victoria subscribed a 
farthing a piece out of their money, so that Betsy might have a quarter of a pound 
of meat V She added that her sister wanted it, and that it would do her good. 
Upon my word, she made the proposals and the calculations in an instant, and all 
of her own accord. And before we left them, Betsy had put on the queerest little 
black shawl and bonnet, and had a mug and basket ready to receive the purchases 
in question. 

" Sedan Court has a particularly friendly look to me since that day. Peace be 
with you, O, thrifty, kindly, simple, loving little maidens ! May their voyage in 
life prosper ! Think of that great journey before them, and the little cock-boat 
manned by babies venturing over the stormy ocean." — Spec. 



CHARITY AND HUMOUR. 291 

Phenomenon, and all those poor theatre people in that 
charming book ! What a humour ! and what a good-hu 
mour ! I coincide with the youthful critic, whose opinion 
has just been mentioned, and own to a family admiration 
for Nicholas Nickleby. 

One might go on, though the task would be endless and 
needless, chronicling the names of kind folks with whom 
this kind genius has made us familiar. Who does not love 
the Marchioness, and Mr. Richard Swiveller ! Who doG& 
not sympathize, not only with Oliver Twist, but his admi- 
rable young friend the Artful Dodger ? Who has not the 
inestimable advantage of possessing a Mrs. Nickleby in his 
own family ? Who does not bless Sairey (ramp and won- 
der at Mrs. Harris. Who does not venerate the chief of 
that illustrious family who, being stricken by misfortune, 
wisely and greatly turned his attention to " coals," the ac- 
complished, the Epicurean, the dirty, the delightful Mi- 
cawber ? 

I may quarrel with Mr. Dickens's art a thousand and a 
thousand times, I delight and wonder at his genius ; I rec- 
ognize in it — I speak with awe and reverence — a commis- 
sion from that Divine Beneficence, whose blessed task we 
know it will one day be to wipe every tear from every eye. 
Thankfully I take my share of the feast of love and kind- 
ness, which this gentle, and generous, and charitable soul 
has contributed to the happiness of the world. I take and 
enjoy my share, and say a Benediction for the meal. 



The End. 



THACKERAY'S WORKS. 



The English Humorists 

of the Eighteenth Century. A Series of Lectures. To which is append- 
ed the Lecture on " Charity and Humor," written and delivered for 
the benefit of a Ladies Charitable Association in New York. 12mo, 
Muslin. 

Why have I alluded to this man ? I have alluded to him, reader, because I think I see 
in him an intellect profounder and more unique than his contemporaries have yet recog- 
nized ; because I regard him as the first social regenerator of the day — as the very master 
of that working corps who would restore to rectitude the warped system of things ; be- 
cause I think no commentator on his writings has yet found the comparison that suits him, 
the terms which rightly characterize his talent. They say he is like Fielding ; they talk 
of his wit, humor, comic powers. He resembles Fielding as an eagle does a vulture; 
Fielding could stoop on carrion, but Thackeray never does. His wit is bright, his humor 
attractive, but both bear the same relation to his serious genius that the mere lambent 
sheet-lightning, playing under the edge of the summer cloud, does to the electric death* 
spark hid in its womb. — " Currer Bell," Author oi Jane Eyre, Shirley, and ViUette. 



History of Henry Esmond, 

Late Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen Anne. Written by 
Himself 8vo, Paper, 50 cents. 

It is a book far beyond the common. Its mere execution is admirable for execution and 
finish. It has thought enough between its covers to set up a dozen ordinary book-wrights, 
and wisdom enough to make the capital of any quantity of moral philosophers. It em- 
braces, besides, the finest portrait of Marlborough e.xtant, and vivid and life-like sketches 
of the first Pretender, of Steele, Swift, Bolingbroke, and other historical personages. 
Moreover, it paints the manners, the costumes, and the society of the times as has never 
been excelled by any writer of fiction whatever, and all this in a quiet and natural way, 
that is perfectly delightful. The book reads, in fact, like a plain statement of plain facts, 
recorded by a real Col. Esmond. — Boston Post. 

In point of style and skill in composition, Henry Esmond is fully equal to its predeces- 
sors. The archaisms and slight tinge of pedantry, by the aid of which the reader is car- 
ried back to the period when the scene is laid, are exquisitely managed ; the historical per- 
sonages who appear as secondary characters, are sketched with great felicity ; the pas- 
sages of moral reflection, where the author steps forward in his own person, are equal to 
any thing in " Vanity Fair" or " Pendennis ;" while the whole piece is more delicately and 
harmoniously toned than either of those works. — Xew York Daily Times. 

" This book has the great charm of reality. Queen Anne's Colonel writes his life (and 
a very interesting life it is) just as a Queen Anne's Colonel might be supposed to have 
written it." 

The style is manly, clear, terse, and vigorous, reflecting every mood — pathetic, grave, 
and sarcastic— of the writer. — Spectator. 

The hearers of Mr. Thackeray's Lectures must remember how great a favorite the kindly, 
improvident, and dissipated Steele was, and will not be surprised to hear that he fills the 
largest space of any of the wits of authors introduced into the novel. He is brought before 
our eyes as he lived and talked, with all his virtues and all his weaknesses. The portrait 
is evidently drawn con amore, and its fidelity and finish are of the highest order.— Ljtfrary 
GazetU 



Thackeray's works 



Vanity Fair. 

A Novel without a Hero. With Illustrations. 8vo, Paper, $1 00 ; 
Muslin, $1 25. 

" Vanittj Fair" must be admitted to be one of the most original works of real genius tbat 
has of late been given to the world. It will take a lasting place in our literature. — Exam 
iner. 

We were little prepared for the keen observation, the deep wisdom, and the consummate 
art which Mr. Thackeray has interwoven in the slight te,\tnre and whimsical pattern of 
" Vanity Fair." It is one of the most amusing books we have read for many a long year. 
— London Quarterly Review. 



The History of Pendennis. 

His Fortunes and his Misfortunes, his Friends and his greatest Enemy. 
With Illustrations. 2 vols. 8vo, Paper, $1 60 ; Muslin, $2 00. 

Thackeray must take his stand at the head of the prose satirists, if not of the novelists, 
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Homes and Haunts of the British Poets. 

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History of Wonderful Inventions. 

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Life and Writings of Cassius M. Clay ; 

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The Valley of the Mississippi. 

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Extension of Civil Government by the United States, until the 
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Southey's Life of John Wesley ; 

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Pictorial History of England. 

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6 Valuable Works on Biography and History. 

Diplomatic and Official Papers of Daniel "Web- 
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Life of the Chevalier Bayard. 

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History of Europe, 

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Life of Charlemagne. 

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Life of Henry IV., 

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History of Chivalry and the Crusades. 

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Neander's Life of Christ ; 

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Lives of CeleLrated British Statesmen. 

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